THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 


THE  LIFE  OF 
JAMES  McNEILL  WHISTLER 

BT  ELIZABETH  ROBINS  PENNELL 
AND  JOSEPH  PENNELL 

Sixth  and  Revised  Edition 

NIGHTS 

ROME— VENICE  LONDON— PARIS 

In  the  .Esthetic  Eighties  In  the  Fighting  Nineties 

BT  ELIZABETH  ROBINS  PENNELL 

Large  Crown  8vo,  16  illustrations. 

THE  LOVERS 

BT  ELIZABETH  ROBINS  PENNELL 

Small  12  mo.     Frontpiece 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  PICTURES  OF 
WAR  WORK  IN  AMERICA 

36  Plates.     Octavo. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  PICTURES  OF 
WAR  WORK  IN  ENGLAND 

Introduction  by  H.  G.  Wells.    51  Plates.    Octavo. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  PICTURES  OF 
THE  WONDER  OF  WORK 

33  Plates.     Octavo. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  PICTURES  IN 
THE  LAND  OF  TEMPLES 

40  Plates.     Octavo. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  PICTURES  OF 
THE  PANAMA  CANAL 

28  Plates.     Octavo. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL'S  LIBERTY 
LOAN  POSTER 

Illustrated.     Octavo. 

OUR  PHILADELPHIA 

BY  ELIZABETH  ROBINS  PENNELL 
ILLUSTRATED  BY  JOSEPH  PENNELL 

Quarto,  714  x  10  ins.     xiv  +  552  pages. 


J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 
PHILADELPHIA 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 


BY 


E.  R.  &  J.  PENNELL 
AUTHORS  MOF  THE 
AUTHORIZED  LIFE  OF 
JAMES  McN.  WHISTLER 

ILLUSTRATED 


PHILADELPHIA 

J.   B.    LIPPINCOTT    COMPANY 
1921 


COPYRIGHT,  IQ2I,  BY  E.  R.  AND  J.  PENNELL 


HD33? 

ri 


PRINTED   BY   J.   B.   L1PP1NCOTT  COMPANY 

AT  THE  WASHINGTON  SQUARE  PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA,  U.  S.  A. 


PREFACE 

This  book  needs  no  preface  or  apology  or  explanation.  Each  will 
be  found  in  it.  It  is  the  story  of  the  life  Whistler  lived  with  us 
during  the  three  years  after  he  asked  us  to  write  it,  and  the  story 
he  told  us  of  the  sixty-six  previous  years  of  his  troubled,  triumphal 
career — the  foundation  upon  which  the  biography  was  built  up. 
But  in  a  biography  the  intimate  tone  of  a  journal  is  not  appropriate 
and  only  certain  portions  could  be  used.  We  have  had  both  pleas 
ure  and  pain  in  recording  what  he  gave  us  and  also  what  we  learned 
of  him  from  others.  For,  when  we  were  writing  the  Authorized 
Life,  we  received  aid  and  assistance  from  every  one  except  his  wife's 
family  who  had  nothing  they  could  have  given  us  save  the  docu 
ments  and  letters  they  may  possess,  if  they  preserved  them.  Mr. 
Freer  was  the  other  exception.  Now,  however,  Mr.  Lodge,  Curator 
of  the  Freer  Collection,  has  granted  us  the  permissions  we  have 
asked  and,  with — we  hope — the  early  opening  of  that  Gallery,  a 
large  amount  of  information  about  Whistler,  as  well  as  many  of  his 
important  works,  will  be  available. 

Whistler's  fame  has  vastly  increased,  the  commercial  value  of  his 
work — now  the  artistic  standard — has  also  vastly  increased, 
and  we  have  done  what  we  could  to  increase  the  world's  knowledge 
of  Whistler  as  we  knew  him.  Miss  Philip  has  given  her  interpre 
tation  of  him  and  his  wishes.  When  his  Society  proposed  to  honour 
his  memory  by  a  Memorial  Exhibition,  she  was  at  first  willing  to 
help.  Then  she  became  sure  he  did  not  wish  his  work  in  an  English 
Gallery,  but  not  till  she  had  shown  it  in  the  International.  Later 
on,  there  seemed  no  question  that  his  wishes  could  not  be  opposed 
to  her  contributing  to  a  small  Whistler  exhibition  at  the  Tate 
Gallery,  or  to  her  making  a  special  exhibition  from  her  own  col 
lection  of  his  paintings  and  pastels  at  Obach's.  She,  and  Arthur 
Studd,  who  supported  her,  and  who  afterwards  bequeathed  his 
Whistlers  to  the  British  nation,  leave  us  in  doubt  therefore  as  to 
"the  master's  wishes."  Nor  is  the  information,  attributed  to  Miss 
Philip  this  year,  concerning  the  printing  of  the  lithographs  exhibited 
at  Obach's  in  London  and  Keppel's  in  New  York  exactly  what  one 
would  have  expected  from  Whistler. 

Many  besides  Freer  are  dead — saddest  to  us,  William  Heinemann, 
Whistler's  true  friend  and  our  true  friend,  killed  like  so  many  good 
men  by  the  war.  Richard  Canfield  is  gone  and  his  collection  scat 
tered,  all  save  the  lithographs  which  are  preserved  in  the  Brooklyn 
Museum.  And  Arthur  Jerome  Eddy  who,  like  Canfield,  will  live 
by  his  portrait.  And  the  Hadens,  and  Mrs.  William  Whistler,  and 


46923G 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Rodin,  and  William  Michael  Rossetti,  and  Swinburne.  Indeed,  so 
many  have  gone,  that  we  realize  how  soon  the  time  will  come  when 
none  will  remain  who  knew  Whistler,  knew  the  facts  of  his  life. 
It  is  for  this  reason  we  have  thought  it  wise  to  publish  information 
as  it  was  given  us,  by  those  who  did  know  him  in  days  when  we 
did  not,  even  their  opinions  and  impressions  which  we  do  not  al 
ways  share.  We  wish  to  say  now  much  that  was  left  unsaid,  or  half- 
said,  in  the  Life,  to  give  many  details  that  could  wait  then,  but  can 
wait  no  longer.  For  there  have  been  too  many  examples  of  white 
washing  by  contemporaries  too  cowardly  to  tell  the  truth,  too  many 
examples  of  the  eagerness  of  posterity  when  freed  from  all  responsible 
witnesses,  to  distort  and  play  with  incidents  and  adventures  in 
the  lives  of  the  great  dead,  finding  scandals  in  mean  hints  and  idle 
gossip,  the  delight  of  the  ignorantly  inquisitive  who  sit  in  bio 
graphic  judgment.  We  would  spare  Whistler,  if  we  could,  the  fate 
of  figuring  in  the  future  as  "the  true  Whistler,"  subjected  to  the 
dissection,  the  misrepresentation  of  busy-bodies,  from  which  too 
many  great  men  have  suffered.  Nothing  in  Whistler's  life  needs  to 
be  concealed.  He  was  human.  Who  is  not?  But  the  truth  cannot 
detract  from  his  fame  as  the  most  striking  personality,  the  most 
distinguished  artist  of  his  time. 

Our  record  of  his  life  is  not  only  in  our  Whistler  biography  and  our 
Whistler  Journal  but  in  the  collection  of  Whistleriana  that  we 
have  presented  to  the  Library  of  Congress,  which  Mr.  Herbert 
Putnam,  the  Librarian,  says  "has,  as  a  record,  a  completeness 
probably  unparalleled  by  that  of  any  other  artist  or  writer." 
It  is  also  a  record  of  the  story  of  modern  art  from  all  sides  as  well 
as  from  Whistler's.  ^ 

The  opening  of  this  exhibition  of  a  fraction,  though  it  includes  over 
600  items,  of  our  Whistleriana  in  Washington  at  the  Library  of  Con 
gress  has  proved  to  us  conclusively,  however,  that  if  there  ever  was 
an  artless  age  and  an  artless  race  it  is  this.  No  people  talk  so  much 
around  art  and  care  so  little  for  it.  When  the  Whistler  Memorial 
Exhibition  was  held  in  London  it  was  visited  by  thousands  daily. 
The  King  and  Queen  asked  to  come.  It  was  opened  by  Ambassa 
dors  and  supported  by  the  press.  Here,  in  the  first  weeks,  not  a 
thousand  people  visited  the  exhibition.  But  one  Ambassador  has 
come  near  it — naturally  M.  Jusserand,  the  French  Ambassador; 
but  one  Minister,  M.  Peter,  the  Swiss  Minister;  not  a  congressman, 
not  a  senator  that  we  know  of  has  entered  the  Gallery  set  apart 
for  it  in  their  Library.  So  far  as  we  can  find  out,  not  a  director 
of  a  Washington  Art  Gallery  has  visited  it.  And,  with  a  single 
exception,  not  a  Washington  paper  has  had  an  adequate  notice  of  it 
vi 


PREFACE 

or  even  one  to  compare  with  those  in  the  papers  of  the  far  West. 
Most  of  the  journals  of  the  Capitol  have  ignored  it. 
Though  so  many  of  Whistler's  friends  have  gone  a  few  are  left. 
Duret  still  lives,  Kennedy,  Lavery,  Guthrie,  Walton,  Sauter,  are 
still  here,  though  the  International — Whistler's  International — is 
dead,  or  become  British,  with  a  Knight  and  an  Academician  for  its 
President.  Truly,  again  the  artists  have  gone  out  and  the  British 
remain,  and  history  repeats  itself.  But  Whistler's  fame  grows. 
If  this  book  is  appreciated,  we  will  continue  to  publish  The  Journal 
kept  till  this  day.  Anyway,  it  will  be  preserved  in  the  Library  of 
Congress  with  our  other  Whistleriana,  even  if  it  is  not  now  appreci 
ated,  waiting  that  future  when  the  world  shall  emerge  from  its  orgy 
of  vulgarity,  sport,  commercialism,  and  the  hypocrisy  it  has  been 
made  safe  for.  But  art  will  triumph  and  the  name  and  fame  of 
Whistler  will  endure.  He  is  with  the  Immortals. 
There  are  again  many  people  to  thank,  many  things  for  which  to 
congratulate  ourselves:  one  of  the  principal,  our  obtaining  the 
papers  in  the  Whistler  v.  Ruskin  libel  action.  After  being  re 
jected  and  refused  by  several  collectors  and  museums  of  America, 
the  Whistler  papers  came  to  us  and  now  with  other  Whistler 
iana,  are  in  the  Library  of  Congress — priceless  documents  which 
will  be  valued  in  the  future  though  they  were  spurned  today.  What 
would  we  give  for  a  record  of  Rembrandt's  bankruptcy?  And  the 
record  of  Whistler's  is  ours.  His  Honour  Judge  Parry,  son  of 
Mr.  Serjeant  Parry,  Whistler's  barrister  in  the  Whistler  v.  Ruskin 
case,  has  more  recently  obtained  for  us,  to  be  deposited  in  the 
Library  of  Congress  with  our  Whistleriana,  the  Ruskin  papers 
from  Messrs.  Walker,  Martineau  and  Co.,  Ruskin's  solicitors,  so 
that  the  documents  are  complete  and  the  record  is  intactfor  future 
reference.  Not  only  our  thanks  but  the  thanks  of  our  country  are 
due  to  Judge  Parry  and  to  Messrs.  Walker,  Martineau  and  Co., 
especially  Mr.  J.  A.  Hammett,  one  of  the  firm,  for  this  important 
gift  to  the  Library  and  therefore  to  the  nation.  There  are  many 
others  who  possess  papers  and  documents  about  Whistler,  and  it  is 
our  hope  that  they  may  add  them  and  make  perfect  the  unrivalled 
collection  which  the  United  States  Government  now  owns.  We 
have  also  in  the  Washington  Collection  the  entire  Whistler  Memo 
rial  correspondence  and  the  photographs  of  the  properly  rejected 
design  by  Rodin,  rejected  rightly  by  artists — and  Rodin  was  their 
President.  We  must  here  again  thank  Mr.  Putnam,  Librarian  of 
Congress,  for  allowing  us  to  exhibit  so  admirably  a  selection  of  our 
Whistleriana,  which  has  grown  with  and  out  of  this  book,  and  the 
various  officials  of  the  Library,  especially  Professor  Rice,  Mr. 

vii 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Roberts  and  Mr.  Bier,  who  helped  us  to  install  it  in  the  Print  Di 
vision,  and  Miss  Wright  and  Miss  Bier  for  much  work.  It  has 
been  the  American  public  alone  which  has  shown  no  interest.  The 
American  public  of  the  present  will  not  last,  or  the  country  will 
not  last.  But  the  name  and  fame  of  Whistler  will  endure. 
Messrs.  Knoedler  have  greatly  aided  us  by  furnishing  us  with  many 
photographs  and  much  information  about  works  in  their  possession. 
Messrs.  Rosenbach  supplied  us  with  the  Greaves  portraits  in  abun 
dance,  and  we  have  shown  and  told  the  performances  of  the 
Brothers  Greaves  for  the  first  time.  Mrs.  Eddy  has  given  us  the 
portrait  of  her  husband  which,  during  his  lifetime,  he  refused  to 
publish  even  in  his  own  book  on  Whistler.  Messrs.  Keppel  have, 
as  usual,  helped  in  many  ways,  and  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
especially,  permitting  us  to  use  the  illustrations  in  their  catalogue  of 
the  lithographs;  and  so  have  other  dealers  who  know  and  under 
stand.  They  have  also  shown  us,  and  consulted  us  about,  the  end 
less  fakes  with  which  the  country  is  flooded,  and  are  a  delightful 
contrast  to  those  amateur  collectors  who  know  everything  about 
Whistler  and  cannot — 'Some  of  them — tell  his  signature  from 
Harper  Pennington's  to  say  nothing  of  a  good  work  from  a  bad 
imitation;  a  contrast  also  to  the  amateur  amateurs  and  the  business 
men  who,  if  they  employed  the  same  methods  in  collecting  cash 
as  they  do  in  collecting  art,  would  find  themselves  in  the  bank 
ruptcy  court  in  six  months — and  occasionally  they  do.  The  re 
storer  too  is  abroad  and  works  have  been  utterly  ruined,  notably 
The  Lange  Leizen  in  the  Johnson  Collection,  all  the  skin  cleaned, 
scraped,  scrubbed  off  it. 

We  have  been  helped  by  Mr.  J.  P.  Heseltine;  Mr.  Sydney  Pawling; 
greatly  by  Mr.  Mitchell  Kennerley;  Mr.  Kent  of  the  Metropolitan 
Museum;  the  Milch  Gallery;  Mr.  E.  G.  Kennedy;  Miss  Alice 
Roullier;  Mr.  Weitenkampf  of  the  New  York  Public  Library;  Mr. 
W.  H.  Fox  of  the  Brooklyn  Museum;  Mr.  George  Stevens  of  the 
Toledo  Gallery;  Mr.  J.  E.  Lodge,  Curator  of  the  Freer  Gallery; 
Mr.  Lucas;  Mr.  Bement  of  the  Maryland  Institute,  who,  under  the 
excellent  guidance  of  Mr.  C.  Lewis  Hind,  the  Editor  of  The  Studio, 
and  Mr.  Fitz  Roy  Carrington,  Lecturer  on  Prints  at  Harvard, 
discovered  forty  water-colours,  two  pen  drawings,  and  twenty  some 
wash-drawings  which  turned  out  to  be  two  water-colours,  one  pen 
drawing  and  one  rejected  wash  drawing  in  black-and-white. 
Recently  we  have  been  assured  by  the  editors  of  an  art  paper  that 
"So  much  has  been  written  about  Whistler,  a  certain  weariness  is 
making  itself  felt."  It  is  this  desire  for  some  new  thing  that  has 
made  the  Isms  so  popular  in  a  world  of  ignorant  amateurs.  With 
viii 


PREFACE 

such  people  and  in  the  art  schools,  so-called,  of  the  country, 
Whistler  is  not  the  fashion — he  requires  too  much  knowledge  to 
understand,  too  much  ability  to  follow.  So  they  all  go  the  easier 
way,  and  art  in  America  today  is  dormant.  Artlessness  and  Cu 
bism  and  other  Isms  are  the  fashion,  and  fashion  rules  art  here, 
not  tradition.  But  art  will  live  and  Whistler  is  among  the  Artists. 

JOSEPH  PENNELL 
ELIZABETH  ROBINS  PENNELL 

BROOKLYN,  September   I,  1921 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

AN  INTRODUCTION  AND  AN  EXPLANATION.  THE  YEAR 
NINETEEN  HUNDRED  i 

CHAPTER  I:  THE  BEGINNING.  HOW  WE  GOT  TO  KNOW 
WHISTLER.  THE  YEARS  EIGHTEEN  EIGHTY  TO  EIGHTEEN 
EIGHTY-FIVE  2 

CHAPTER  II:  THE  BEGINNING  CONTINUED.  GETTING  TO 
KNOW  WHISTLER  BETTER.  THE  YEARS  EIGHTEEN  EIGHTY- 
FIVE  TO  EIGHTEEN  NINETY-SEVEN  8 

CHAPTER  III:  THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL.  THE 
PRE-RAPHAELITES  AND  OTHERS.  THE  YEARS  EIGHTEEN 
NINETY-SEVEN  AND  EIGHTEEN  NINETY-EIGHT  18 

CHAPTER  IV:  THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL.  THE  YEARS  EIGH 
TEEN  EIGHTY-NINE  TO  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  31 

CHAPTER  V:  THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER 
JOURNAL.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  41 

CHAPTER  VI:  CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL,  HIS  FRIENDS 
AND  HIS  ENEMIES.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CON 
TINUED  58 

CHAPTER  VII:  EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES.  THE  YEAR  NINE 
TEEN  HUNDRED  CONTINUED  70 

CHAPTER  VIII:  THE  LEYLANDS,  THEIR  CIRCLE,  AND  THE 
PEACOCK  ROOM.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CON 
TINUED  96 

CHAPTER  IX:  THE  GREAVES.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUN 
DRED  CONTINUED  114 

CHAPTER  X:  JO  AND  MAUD.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUN 
DRED  CONTINUED  145 

CHAPTER  XI:  WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  AND  OTHER  THINGS 
OF  EARLY  DAYS.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CON 
TINUED  167 

CHAPTER  XII:  FAILING  HEALTH  AND  HIS  WANDERINGS. 
THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CONTINUED  189 

CHAPTER  XIII:  THE  RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  WHIST 
LER'S  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED 
AND  ONE  208 

XI 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHAPTER  XIV:  FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE.  THE  YEAR 
NINETEEN  HUNDRED  AND  TWO  223 

CHAPTER  XV:  THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO  AFTER  THE 
RETURN  TO  LONDON.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  AND 
TWO  CONTINUED  250 

CHAPTER  XVI:  THE  LAST  MONTHS.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  AND  THREE  272 

CHAPTER  XVII:  THE  LAST  DAYS.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  AND  THREE  CONTINUED  289 

APPENDIX  I:  WHISTLER  AS  A  DECORATOR,  FROM  THE 
CENTURY  MAGAZINE  FOR  FEBRUARY  1912,  BY  PERMISSION 
OF  THE  CENTURY  COMPANY  299 

APPENDIX  II:    THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL  307 

APPENDIX  III:  THE  PAPERS  IN  THE  WHISTLER- RUSKIN 
LIBEL  CASE  316 


xn 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

G.,  after  an  etching,  refers  to  the  Grolier  Club  Catalogue  of  Whistler's 

Etchings 

M.,  refers  to  the  Caxton  Club  Catalogue 

W.,  after  a  lithograph,  refers  to  Way's  and  Kennedy's  Catalogues  of 

Whistler's  Lithographs 

FIRELIGHT— JOSEPH  PENNELL  (Lithograph.  W.  104)  Frontispiece 

PORTRAIT  OF  E.  R.  PENNELL  (Lithograph.  W.  103)  Frontispiece 

Autographed  Proofs  by  Whistler  from  the  Pennell  Collection,  Library 

of  Congress,  Washington 

Photogravures  by  Messrs.  F.  A.  Ringler  Co.,  Printed  by  Messrs.  Peters 

Brothers 

To  face  page 

TABLET  AND  BRASS  TO  MEMBERS  OF  THE  WHISTLER  FAMILY  IN  THE  CHURCH 
AT  GORING-ON-THAMES,  ENGLAND  I 

Rubbings  in  Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  AT  CHELSEA  (By  Sir  F.  Seymour  Haden)  (Etching) 
WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  AT  CHELSEA  (By  Joseph  Pennell)  (Etching)  2 

THE  WHITE  HOUSE  (Photograph  by  W.  E.  Gray)  3 

LADY  MEUX  TRIPLEX — CARICATURE  OF  WHISTLER  PAINTING  THE  THREE 
PORTRAITS  OF  LADY  MEUX  AT  ONCE  (Unknown)  3 

In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 

WHISTLER  ABOUT  THE  TIME  OF  His  RETURN  FROM  VENICE  (Photograph  by 
Mendelsohn)  6 

Loaned  by  Burton  Mansfield,  Esq. 

PORTRAIT  BY  CARLO  PELLEGRINI,  "APE"  (Dry-Point)  6 

POSTER  OF  THE  SALE  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE  (Proof)  7 

"On  the  premises  of  Mr.  Whistler"  omitted  from  poster  used. 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

21  CHEYNE  WALK  (By  Joseph  Pennell)  (Etching)  8 

IN  THE  GARDEN  OF  SAME  (Lithograph.    W.  38)  8 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 

W.  E.  HENLEY  (Lithograph.    W.  127)  9 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
POSTER  FOR  EXHIBITION  OF  NOCTURNES,  MARINES  AND  CHEVALET  PIECES         10 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

LATE  PIQUETTE  (Lithograph.    W.  57)  10 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 

xiii 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
STEPHANE  MALLARME  (Lithograph.    W.  66]  II 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
THE  DUET  (Lithograph.     Undescribed)  II 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
Miss  MILDRED  HOWELLS  (Lithograph.    W.  75)  12 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
MOTHER  AND  DAUGHTER  (Lithograph.     Undescribed}  13 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
STUDY  PORTRAIT  OF  JOSEPH  PENNELL  (Lithograph.    W.  ill)  14 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
THE  RUSSIAN  SCHUBE  (Lithograph.    W.  112)  14 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
NELSON  BOARDED  AT  LAST  14 

Reproduction  from  The  Daily  Chronicle 
NOT  KNOWN  AT  THE  ROYAL  ACADEMY  14 

Reproduction  from  The  Daily  Mail.     Originals  in  Pennell  Collection, 

Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
WHISTLER  MAKING  A  LITHOGRAPH  AT  WAY'S  (By  T.  R.  Way)  (Lithograph)         14 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  T.  R.  Way 
PORTRAIT  OF  THOMAS  WAY  (Lithograph.    W.  107)  14 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER  (By  J.  Boldini)  (Oil)  18 

Brooklyn  Museum 

PORTRAIT  MADE  WHILE  WHISTLER  POSED  TO  BOLDINI   (By  Paul  Helleu) 
(Dry-Point)  18 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
WHISTLER  SLEEPING  (By  J.  Boldini)  (Dry-Point)  18 

Done  between  poses  in   Boldini's   Studio.     In  the  possession  of  E.  G. 

Kennedy,  Esq. 
WHISTLER  IN  His  PARIS  STUDIO  (By  Dornac)  (Photograph)  18 

Showing  the  screen  with  Battersea  Bridge  made  for  Leyland 
FRUITIERE,  RUE  DE  CRENELLE  (Lithograph.    W.  70)  20 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
ST.  GiLES-iN-THE-FiELDS  (Lithograph.    W.  120)  21 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 

SWINBURNE  (Dry-Point.   M.  136)  24 

PORTRAIT,  ATTRIBUTED  TO  WHISTLER  (Oil)  25 

PORTRAIT  BY  FANTIN  LATOUR  (Oil)  25 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
xiv 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  jace  page 
WHISTLER  IN  THE  BIG  HAT— HAT  WORN  IN  PARIS  AND  ON  JOURNEY  TO  ALSACE 

(Etching.  M.  54}  28 

PROOF  OF  DESTROYED  PLATE  28 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

WHISTLER  SMOKING  (Oil)  29 

Attributed  to  Whistler.     By  permission  of  A.  E.  Gallatin,  Esq. 
WHISTLER  IN  THE  BIG  HAT  (Oil]  29 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
LINDSFY  Row  (By  Joseph  Pennell)  (Etching}  34 

Whistler  lived  in  the  houses  at  each  end  of  the  Row 
MILLBANK  (Etching.    M.  71}  35 

Used  as  invitation  card  to  Thomas's  Exhibition  of  Etchings 
DR.  WHISTLER  (Lithograph.    W.  78)  38 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 
SKETCH  FROM  THE  PORTRAIT  IN  THE  1900  PARIS  EXHIBITION  (Pen-and-ink)     40 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER  FROM  TITLE  TO  THE  FRENCH  SET  (Etching.  M.  25)        44 
UNPUBLISHED  TITLE  TO  FRENCH  SET  (Etching)  45 

Grolier  Club  Supplement.     By  permission  of  the  Grolier  Club 
DROUET  (Etching.  M.  55)  48 

RIAULT  (Etching.  M.  65)  49 

SPEKE  HALL  (Dry-Point.   M.  g6)  54 

LYME  REGIS  (Water-Colour]  55 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Knowles 
C.  A.  HOWELL  (By  H.  T.  Dunn)  (Pen-and-ink)  58 

In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  W.  M.  Rossetti 
CHELSEA  EMBANKMENT  (Oil)  59 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
ROSA  CORDER  (Pen  and  Wash)  60 

In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 
SELSEY  BILL  (Water-Colour)  61 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Knowles 

CHINESE  CABINET  SUBJECT  OF  THE  OWL  AND  THE  CABINET  (Photo)  62 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
DESIGNS  FOR  BLUE  AND  WHITE  CHINA  (Wash}  70 

The  Murray  Marks  Collection 

DRAWING  FOR  SIR  HENRY  THOMPSON'S  CATALOGUE  OF  A  COLLECTION  OF  BLUE 
AND  WHITE  NANKIN  PORCELAIN  (Wash)  71 

In  the  possession  of  Pickford  R.  Waller,  Esq. 

XV 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 

COVER  OF  THE  UNIQUE  LARGE  PAPER  COPY  OF  THE  BOOK  71 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

THE  PURPLE  CAP  (Pastel)  78 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 

LITTLE  NUDE  (Pastel)  78 

Formerly  in  the  Canfield  Collection 

BOULEVARD  POISSONIERE  (Etching.  M.  4.23)  79 

BALUSTRADE,  LUXEMBOURG  (Etching.  M.  427)  79 

Groiier  Club  Catalogue 

LA  MERE  GERARD  (Etching.  M.  n)  80 

READING  BY  LAMPLIGHT  (Etching.  M.  33)  81 

Seymour  Haden,  left;  Traer,  centre;  Lady  Haden,  right 

DELATRE  (Etching.  M.  26)  82 

FUMETTE  CROUCHING  (Etching.  M.  13)  82 

BIBI  LALOUETTE  (Etching.  M.  51)  84 

BECQUET  (Etching.  M.  52)  90 

FINETTE  (Etching.  M.  58)  90 

AXENFELD  (Etching.  M.  64)  91 

ASTRUC  (Etching.  M.  53)  91 

F.  R.  LEYLAND  (Etching.  M.  102)  96 

SKETCH  OF  LEYLAND  (Oil)  97 

In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  F.  R.  Leyland 

FLORENCE  LEYLAND  (Dry-Point.  M.  no)  98 

ELINOR  LEYLAND  (Dry-Point.  M.  109)  98 

THE  PEACOCK  ROOM — FROM  A  PHOTOGRAPH  MADE  WHILE  IT  WAS  IN  PLACE 
AT  PRINCES  GATE,  SHOWING  BLUE  AND  WHITE  ON  THE  WALLS  (Photograph)     100 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
RICH  AND  POOR  PEACOCKS  100 

Peacock  Room.     Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
MRS.  LEYLAND.     THE  VELVET  DRESS  (Dry-Point.  M.  105)  101 

STUDIES  OF  MRS.  LEYLAND'S  DRESS.     (Black  and  White  Chalk)  101 

In  the  possession  of  Walter  S.  Brewster,  Esq.  and  Mrs.  Knowles 
SKETCH  OF  DETAIL  OF  PEACOCK  ROOM  (Pen-and-ink)  104 

SKETCH  OF  STAIRWAY  AT  LEYLAND'S  HOUSE — PARTIALLY  DECORATED  BY 

WHISTLER  (Pen  and  Pencil)  104 

In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  Mrs.  Leyland 
SKETCHES  OF  PEACOCK  ROOM  (Pen-and-ink)  105 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  J.  C.  Gardner 
XVI 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
CHELSEA  EMBANKMENT  (Water-Colour)  116 

NOTE  FOR  NOCTURNE  (Black  and  White  Chalk)  1 16 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  T.  R.  Way 
NOCTURNE  (By  Water  Greaves)  (Oil)  120 

In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 
NOCTURNE  (By  Whistler)  (Oil)  120 

In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  Mrs.  Leyland 

LORD  WOLSELEY  (Dry-Point.  M.  164)  121 

WHISTLER'S    ETCHING    NEEDLE — ACTUAL    SIZE    GIVEN    BY   WHISTLER   To 
JOSEPH  PENNELL  122 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

THE  TABLE  PALETTE — USED  IN  FULHAM  STUDIO  (By  G.  P.  Jacomb-Hood) 

(Wash)  122 

MR.  ELDON  (Oil)  123 

Once  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Walter  Sickert  and  attributed  by  him 

to  Whistler 

INTERIOR  OF  THE  STUDIO,  FULHAM  (By  G.  P.  Jacomb-Hood)  (Wash)  124 

TINNIE  GREAVES  (Dry-Point.  M.  141.)  125 

STUDY  OF  CARLYLE  ON  BACK  OF  CANVAS  (Signed  by  Greaves)  (Oil)  128 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Dowdeswell  and  Dowdeswell 
HEAD  OF  CARLYLE  (By  Whistler)  (Oil)  128 

In  the  possession  of  Burton  Mansfield,  Esq. 

WHITE  GIRL.     No.  IV.  (Oil)  134 

In  the  possession  of  John  F.  Braun,  Esq. 

SKETCH  OF  SAME  (Chalk)  135 

Attributed  to  Whistler.    The  Way  Collection 

MRS.  A.  J.  CASSATT  (Pen-and-ink)  136 

In  the  possesssion  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 
BATTERSEA  BRIDGE    (Oil)  137 

Tate  Gallery,  London 
PASSING  UNDER  OLD  BATTERSEA  BRIDGE  (By  Walter  Greaves)  (OiP  137 

From  The  N.  Y.  Herald 
PORTRAITS  OF  JAMES  McNEiLL  WHISTLER   (By  Walter  Greaves)  (Oils)  142 

In  the  possession  of'the  Rosenbach  Co. 
SPY'S  CARICATURE  OF  WHISTLER  (Lithograph)  143 

Published  in  Vanity  Fair 
A  PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER  (By  Walter  Grfaves)  (Oil)  143 

In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 

xvii 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
Jo — PRINT  FROM  THE  DESTROYED  PLATE  (Dry-Point.  M.  77)  146 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

WALL  OF  THE  FIRST  INTERNATIONAL  EXHIBITION  AT  KNIGHTSBRIDGE  150 

(Photograph} 

The  centre  group  of  works  arranged  by  Whistler 
WALL   OF  THE    WHISTLER    EXHIBITION   AT    BRADFORD     (Photograph) 

Arranged  by  Joseph  Pennell.     Oils,  Water-Colours   and   Prints  hung 
together  150 

SKETCHES  BY  WHISTLER — FOR  THE  SEAL  OF  THE  INTERNATIONAL  SOCIETY 
OF  SCULPTORS,  PAINTERS  AND  GRAVERS,  AND  THE  FINAL  DESIGN  USED  BY 
THE  SOCIETY  (Pen-and-ink)  151 

INTERIOR  OF  ROOM  IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  Row  SHOWING 
THE  MANTELPIECE  BEFORE  WHICH  THE  LITTLE  WHITE  GIRL  WAS  PAINTED 
(Contemporary  Photograph)  152 

Loaned  by  Mr.  Chambers 
DINING-ROOM  IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  Row  (Contemporary 

Photograph)  152 

Loaned  by  Mr.  Chambers 

FIREPLACE,  DINING-ROOM  IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  Row        152 
(Contemporary  Photograph) 

Loaned  by  Mr.  Chambers 
INTERIOR  OF  THE  LINDSEY  Row  STUDIO  (By  Walter  Greaves)  (Oil)  154 

In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 
NOTE  BLANCHE — PORTRAIT  OF  Jo  (Oil)  156 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Cobden  Sanderson 

SKETCHES  OF  MAUD  (Pen-and-ink)  157 

WEARY — PORTRAIT  OF  Jo  (Dry-Point.  M.  92)  160 

SKETCH  OF  MAUD  (Pen-and-ink)  162 

Formerly  in  the  possession  of  S.  P.  Avery 

SKETCH  OF  MAUD  (Pen-and-ink)  163 

From  Arrangement   in    White    and    Black    No.  I.,   afterward   called 
L'Ame'ricaine 
CASA  JANKOVITZ,  WHERE  WHISTLER  LIVED  MOST  OF  THE  TIME  IN  VENICE 

(By  Joseph  Pennell)     (Pastel)  164 

WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  IN  THE  VALE,  CHELSEA  (By  W.  E.  Gray)  (Photograph)        166 
THE  DYKE  AT  DOMBURG  (Water-Colour)  167 

SHORE  NEAR  DUBLIN  (Oil)  167 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
ENLARGEMENT  OF  ETCHING  BLACK  LION  WHARF  PUBLISHED  IN  The  Daily 

Chronicle  170 

xviii 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
ILLUSTRATION  TO  LITTLE  JOHANNES  (Drawing  on  Wood}  171 

THE  QUADRI,  VENICE  (By  Joseph  Pennell)  (Pastel)  172 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

PORTRAIT  OF  CARLYLE  (Oil)  174 

Glasgow  Art  Gallery 

SKETCH  OF  THE  PORTRAIT  (Pen-and-ink)  174 

In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 

LION — DESIGNED  FOR  THE  BRITISH  ARTISTS    (Pen-and-ink)  176 

FIRST  PAGE  OF  THE  MEMORIAL  TO  QUEEN  VICTORIA  FROM  THE  BRITISH     176 
ARTISTS     (Water-Colour) 
Royal  Collection,  Windsor 

INTERIOR  OF  GALLERY  OF  THE  BRITISH  ARTISTS  SHOWING  VELARIUM  AND 
ARRANGEMENT  OF  PICTURES  (Pen-and-ink]  177 

Formerly  in  the  possession  of  G.  R.  Halkett 

PAGE  OF  SKETCHES  OF  BRITISH  ARTISTS   EXHIBITION,    1886   (By  Bernard 
Partridge}     (Pen-and-ink)  178 

UNDER  A  BRIDGE  (Pastel)  182 

THE  RIVA  (Black  Chalk)  182 

In  the  possession  of  Mitchell  Kennerley,  Esq. 

VENICE  PASTELS  182 

In  the  possession  of  J.  P.  Heseltine,  Esq. 

THE  GOLD  GIRL,  CONNIE  GILCHRIST,   SKETCHES   OF  THE  PICTURE  (Pen- 
and-ink)  182 
In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B.  and  Henry  Blackburne 

THE  DANCING  GIRL  (Pen-and-ink)  183 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 

THE  QUADRI  AT  VENICE,  WHISTLER'S  CAFE  (By  Joseph  Pennell)  (Pastel)  188 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

SKETCH  OF  WHISTLER  (By  Phil  May)  (Pen-and-ink)  189 

PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER  (Wood-Block  in  Colour)  200 

Drawn  and  cut  by  William  Nicholson,  Esq. 

SKETCH  OF  WHISTLER  (Pen-and-ink)  202 

By  Harper  Pennington  and  Evolution  of  His  Signature 

SKETCH  OF  HARPER  PENNINGTON  (By  Whistler)  (Pen-and-ink)  203 

CAFE,  CORSICA  (Pen-and-ink)  206 

THE  FORGE  (Pen-and-ink)  206 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 

xix 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
WHISTLER  SKETCHING  IN  CORSICA  (By  William  Heinemann)  (Photograph)          208 

A  STREET  IN  CORSICA  (Pen-and-Pencil)  209 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
SMITHS,  AJACCIO  (Chalk)  214 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
PHRYNE  (Oil)  218 

International  Exhibition,  1901 

THE  FORGE,  AJACCIO  (Chalk)  220 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 

RICHARD  A.  CANFIELD  (Oil)  234 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 

ARTHUR  J.  Eddy  (Oil)  240 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Arthur  J.  Eddy 
LA  NAPOLITAINE,  ROSE  ET  OR.    PORTRAIT  OF  CARMEN  Rossi  (Oil)  244 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
LITTLE  EVELYN,  DAUGHTER  OE  D.  C.  THOMSON,  ESQ.  (Lithograph.  W.  no)  254 

By  permission  of  Kennedy  and  Co. 

ROBERT,  COMTE  DE  MONTESQUIOU-FEZENZAC  (Oil)  270 

In  the  Frick  collection 
THE  MOTHER  (Dry-Point.  M.  97)  272 

HENRY  IRVING  (Dry-Point.  M.  770)  272 

From  destroyed  plates.     Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress, 
Washington 

WHISTLER,  ABOUT  1878  (Photograph)  282 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

HOUSE  WHERE  WHISTLER  DIED  AND  CHELSEA  CHURCH  FROM  WHICH  HE 
WAS  BURIED  (By  J.  Pennell)  (Etching)  296 

CORRECTED  COPY  OF  "WHO'S  WHO"  298 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

CABINET  DECORATED  WITH  PAINTED  PANELS  (By  Whistler)  302 

Owned  by  P.  R.  Waller,  Esq. 

SKETCH  FOR  SIDEBOARD  (Pen  Drawing)  302 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

SKETCH  FOR  ROSETTES  (Chalk)  302 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

SKETCH  FOR  MATTING  (Chalk)  3°2 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 

XX 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

To  face  page 
DESIGN  FOR  SILK  BUTTERFLIES  WORN  AT  PRIVATE  VIEW  (Wash}  304 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Wickham  Flower 
THE  EVOLUTION  OF  THE  BUTTERFLY  (Pen-and-ink}  3°4 

Pall  Mall  Magazine 
RODIN'S  REJECTED  MEMORIAL  TO  WHISTLER  (Photographs)  308 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
LETTER  FROM  RODIN  TO  JOSEPH  PENNELL  312 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
COVER  OF  MR.  SERJEANT  PARRY'S  BRIEF  FOR  WHISTLER  318 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
TRIAL.     CARICATURES  OF  TRIAL  (By  M.  Bryan  in  "Judy"}  (Pen-and-ink)        322 


XXI 


TABLET  AND  BRASS  TO  MEMBERS  OF  THE  WHISTLER  FAMILY  IN  THE 

CHURCH  AT  GORING-ON-THAMES,  ENGLAND.     RUBBINGS  IN  PENNELL 

COLLECTION,  LIBRARY  OF  CONGRESS.     WASHINGTON 


AN  INTRODUCTION  AND  AN  EXPLANATION.  THE 
YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED 

"21  Bedford  Street,  London,  W.  C.,  May  28th,  1900. 
DEAR  PENNELL, 

I  have  at  last  got  Whistler  to  consent  that  you  shall  write,  if  you 
will  (and  I  know  you  will  only  too  gladly)  a  book  on  him,  illus 
trated  with  his  pictures,  his  etchings  and  his  drawings.  Here  is 
a  magnificent  opportunity.  Yours  very  sincerely, 

WM.  HEINEMANN." 

WHEN  J.  received  this  letter  he  went  at  once  to  see  Heinemann, 
who  explained  that  he  had  long  wanted  to  publish  a  Life  of  Whistler, 
that  he  had  first  suggested  it  should  be  written  by  W.  E.  Henley, 
but  Whistler  objected,  next  by  Charles  Whibley,  but  Whistler 
protested,  and  then  by  J.  and  Whistler  agreed.  He  would  write  it, 
J.  told  Heinemann,  but  on  one  condition:  that  E.  should  write  it 
with  him.  Heinemann  was  willing.  Would  Whistler  be  willing? 
It  did  not  take  J.  long  to  find  out.  From  Heinemann's  he  went  to 
Whistler's  studio  at  8  Fitzroy  Street.  He  told  Whistler  what  had 
happened.  Whistler  consented,  and  said  he  would  help  us  in  every 
way.  There  should  be  two  volumes,  one  his  life,  the  other  his  work, 
and  he  gave  his  permission  to  have  his  work  photographed,  and 
he  promised  to  tell  us  things  about  himself  just  as  they  occurred 
to  him,  as  he  talked,  whenever  and  wherever  we  met,  and  E.  should 
put  down  what  he  said,  and  he  would  correct  it.  And  so  after  our 
next  meeting  with  him  on  Whit-Sunday,  June  3rd,  1900,  E.  began 
The  Whistler  Journal  which  has  been  kept  up  ever  since. 
J.  had  known  Whistler  sixteen  years,  we  both  had  known  his  work 
long  before  that,  and  many  of  our  most  delightful  memories  are 
of  days  when  there  was  no  thought  of  a  biography.  We  made  few 
notes,  we  kept  no  journal  during  those  years,  but  we  remember 
better  some  things  we  did  not  make  notes  of  than  others  of  which 
notes  were  made.  There  was  no  reason  to  make  notes  until  he 
asked  us,  though  we  were  foolish  not  to,  for  we  were  far  more 
intimate  with  him  than  any  one  else.  But  then,  there  are  many 
other  things  in  our  lives  that  we  should  have  done  that  we  have 
left  undone,  and  when  Whistler  did  ask  us  to  make  notes,  we  began 
to  make  them  with  all  diligence. 
1900]  I 


CHAPTER  I.  THE  BEGINNING.  HOW  WE  GOT  TO  KNOW 
WHISTLER.  THE  YEARS  EIGHTEEN-EIGHTY  TO 
EIGHTEEN  EIGHTY-FIVE 

J.,  a  Quaker  boy  in  Philadelphia,  a  student  of  the  Pennsylvania 
Academy  schools,  first  saw  Whistler's  work  at  the  house  of  the 
President  of  the  Academy,  James  L.  Claghorn,  in  Logan  Square, 
Philadelphia.  Claghorn  was  glad  to  show  his  prints,  and  many 
were  the  First  Day  afternoons  that  J.  spent  looking  them  over  at 
one  end  of  the  room  with  Harry  Poore  and  Gerome  Ferris — fellow 
students  in  the  Academy  Schools  who  cared — Claghorn  with  Peter 
Moran  and  Stephen  J.  Ferris — artists  who  also  cared — sitting  at 
the  other;  Claghorn  encouraging  young  artists  instead  of  patron 
izing  them.  The  prints  that  appealed  most  to  J.  and  that  he 
studied  oftenest  and  with  greatest  interest  were  Whistler's 
and  Haden's. 

His  next  chance  was  at  exhibitions.  In  1881,  Ernest  G.  Brown  of 
the  Fine  Art  Society,  brought  over  from  London  the  first  Venice 
Set  of  twelve  and  showed  them  in  one  of  the  little  galleries  in  the 
Academy,  decorated  in  white  and  gold  as  Whistler  had  decorated 
his  gallery  in  London.  The  show  was  a  failure.  It  wasn't  even 
made  fun  of.  Philadelphians  then  were  Americans  and  didn't  ape 
the  English  as  they  do  now.  Nobody  in  Philadelphia,  except  Clag 
horn,  wanted  Whistlers  at  that  time,  though  J.  revelled  in  them, 
and  though  in  New  York  Wunderlich,  with  whom  Mr.  E.  G. 
Kennedy  then  was,  bought  six  sets,  Mr.  Avery  one,  and  Mr. 
Andrews  another,  while  Mr.  Howard  Mansfield  had  already  begun 
his  fine  collection,  and  Doctor  Darrach  of  Philadelphia,  a  friend  of 
Doctor  Whistler's,  had  The  Thames  Set,  though  this  later  was 
burned  or  lost.  In  1882  the  first  International  Exhibition  of  Etch 
ings  of  any  importance  in  the  United  States  was  given  in  the 
Academy  by  the  Philadelphia  Society  of  Etchers  of  which  J.,  a 
mere  boy,  was  Secretary,  and  a  large  number  of  Whistlers  were 
hung.  The  same  year  J.  heard  Seymour  Haden  lecture  on  etching 
in  Philadelphia,  and  this  lecture  helped  to  draw  the  attention  of 
American  artists  and  American  art  lovers  to  the  art  of  etching. 
He  still  remembers  the  supper  after  the  lecture,  given  by  Claghorn 
to  Haden  at  the  Union  League.  The  exhibition,  lecture,  supper, 
even  the  brand  of  champagne, — O,  that  dear  dead  past! — had  all 
been  arranged  by  Frederick  Keppel  who,  about  the  same  time, 
began  to  publish  J's.  own  prints,  so  that  he  was  often  at  Keppel's 
print  shop  in  New  York  where  he  was  always  sure  to  find  more 

2  [1880-1885 


WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  AT  CHELSEA 

ETCHING 

By  Sir  F.  Seymour  Haden 


(See  page  7) 


WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  AT  CHELSEA 

ETCHING 

By  Joseph  Pennell 


(See  page  7) 


THE  WHITE  HOUSE 
Photograph  by  W.  E.  Gray 


LADY  MEUX  TRIPLEX 

CARICATURE  OF  WHISTLER  PAINTING  THE  THREE  PORTRAITS  OF  LADY 
MEUX  AT  ONCE 

ORIGINALS  PAINTED  IN  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 

In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 


THE  BEGINNING 

Whistlers  to  see  and  to  study,  and  where  he  remembers  copying  in 
pen-and-ink  Haden's  print  of  Whistler's  House  at  Chelsea.  He 
remembers  also  Haden's  praise  of  Whistler's  work.  On  one  occa 
sion  Haden  said  that  if  he  had  to  sell  his  Rembrants  or  his  Whist 
lers,  he  would  sell  the  Rembrants  first.  He  sold  both,  but  he  sold 
the  Whistlers  first. 

E.'s  interest  in  Whistler  was  first  roused  at  much  the  same  moment, 
by  Oscar  Wilde  whom  she  not  only  heard  lecture  during  his  Ameri 
can  lecture  tour,  but  met  while  he  was  in  Philadelphia.  Her  Uncle, 
Charles  Godfrey  Leland,  had  shortly  before  come  home  from 
England  where  Wilde  had  known  him,  admired  him,  looked  up  to 
him  as  the  youth  will  to  the  older  man  in  his  profession.  Leland 
was  living — or  camping  out — in  the  big  Broad  Street  boarding- 
house  where  the  Philadelphia  so-called  Art  Club  now  stands,  and 
Wilde  often  dropped  in  for  a  talk.  His  enthusiasm  had  not  been 
wholly  swallowed  up  in  his  affectations.  It  had  survived  even  the 
mockery  of  imitation — the  velvet  knickerbockers,  the  lilies  and 
sunflowers  of  the  American  college  boys  who  flocked  to  his  lectures 
arrayed  in  all  his  own  aesthetic  glory.  Besides,  there  would  have 
been  no  use  posing  for  Leland,  who  posed  himself  and  would  stand 
no  rivals.  In  Leland's  rooms,  Wilde  was  natural  even  when  he 
returned  from  the  West  in  cowboy  hat  and  flowing  cloak,  or  came 
back  from  Camden  and  Walt  Whitman.  His  talk  was  extraordinary 
to  a  girl  who  had  never  been  further  from  Philadelphia  than  Rich 
mond  in  Virginia.  Like  his  lectures,  it  was  mostly  around  art,  and 
he  had  no  more  to  say  about  anyone  than  Whistler.  He  had  not 
then  outgrown  his  deference  nor  the  acknowledgment  of  his  debt. 
He  was  a  worshipper  at  Whistler's  shrine,  he  said. 
But  most  important  to  both  of  us  was  the  fact  that  at  the  Pennsyl 
vania  Academy  in  1881,  Whistler's  portrait  of  his  Mother  was  hung: 
not  in  the  place  of  honour,  but  in  the  narrow  North  Corridor  beside 
the  staircase.  To  Mrs.  Anna  Lea  Merritt  belongs  the  credit  of 
getting  Whistler  to  allow  the  picture  to  be  sent  over,  in  the  hope 
that  it  might  be  purchased  by  the  Academy.  The  price  was  one 
thousand  dollars  and,  since  writing  the  Life,  we  have  heard  that 
it  could  have  been  had  for  five  hundred — we  might  recall  the  fact 
that  the  French  Government  gave  Whistler  six  hundred  and  twenty 
dollars  for  it.  After  the  painting  had  unsuccessfully  toured  America, 
it  returned  to  Chelsea,  and  the  Pennsylvania  Academy  of  the  Fine 
Arts,  having  lost  a  golden  opportunity,  has  now  bought  and  hung 
upon  its  walls  one  of  the  innumerable  Greaves  portraits  of  Whistler. 
True,  the  Academy  did  bestow  its  medals  upon  Whistler.  The 
1880-1885]  3 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Carnegie  Art  Institute,  fifteen  years  afterwards  (1896),  bought  for 
five  thousand  dollars  the  Sarasate,  the  first  picture  Whistler  sold 
to  a  public  gallery  in  America,  though  the  Wilstach  Collection  in 
Philadelphia  purchased  The  Yellow  Buskin  from  a  dealer  in  1894. 
Mr.  Harrison  S.  Morris,  who  was  Director  of  the  Pennsylvania 
Academy  at  the  time,  has  told  us  how  it  came  about.  The  picture 
was  at  the  Chicago  Exposition  in  1893  with  the  Prince sse  du  Pays 
de  la  Porcelaine  and  The  Fur  Jacket,  and,  at  the  close  he  brought 
the  three  to  Philadelphia,  showed  them  in  the  Academy  in  1894, 
and  persuaded  John  G.  Johnson  to  buy  The  Yellow  Buskin,  for  the 
Wilstach  Collection.  Alexander  Reid,  the  Glasgow  dealer  from 
whom  it  was  obtained,  asked  fifteen  thousand  dollars  for  it,  Johnson 
offered  seven  thousand  five  hundred,  and  his  offer  was  accepted. 
We  also  remember  seeing  in  those  earlier  days  The  White  Girl  in 
the  Metropolitan  Museum,  New  York,  where  Tom  Whistler,  he 
told  J.,  sent  it  to  escape  paying  insurance,  and  where,  later,  Mrs. 
Untermeyer's  Falling  Rocket  was  hung.  But  the  Metropolitan 
Museum  only  waked  up  to  an  appreciation  of  Whistler  under  its 
present  Director  Mr.  Robinson,  his  predecessor  Sir  Charles  Purdon 
Clark  having  calmly  announced  that  he  "did  not  understand 
Whistler  and  did  not  want  to." 

In  1884,  after  we  were  married,  we  went  together  to  England,  with 
much  work  to  do  for  The  Century.  One  commission  was  to  illus 
trate  articles  on  Old  Chelsea  by  Dr.  Benjamin  Ellis  Martin,  who 
knew  not  only  Old  Chelsea  but  much  of  the  rest  of  Old  London, 
and  who,  from  that  summer  until  the  day  of  his  death,  had  for  us 
the  further  charm  of  being  as  American  as  Americans  used  to  be 
and  are  no  longer,  seeming  all  the  more  so  against  his  English 
background.  The  scheme  was  to  get  Whistler  to  make  drawings 
or  etchings  for  the  articles  and  J.  went  to  see  him  about  this  in  his 
studio  at  No.  13  Tite  Street.  At  the  time  E.  had  undertaken  to 
keep  a  diary  which  we  wish  she  had  succeeded  in  doing.  The 
record  of  the  work  in  Chelsea  went  no  further  than  "  J.  to  Chelsea" 
until  Monday,  July  I3th,  1884,  when  a  few  details  were  added  in 
the  first  Whistler  note  she  ever  made: 

Monday,  July  ijth,  1884.  J.  to  Chelsea,  and  called  on  Whistler 
about  The  Century  work.  Whistler  was  at  lunch  in  a  blue  and 
yellow  room — asked  J.  to  stay.  J.  asked  him  about  the  Thames 
plates  which  Whistler  said  were  all  done  out  of  doors.  Talked  for 
two  hours — mostly  about  himself  and  his  work.  Pointed  to  a 
4  [1880-1885 


THE  BEGINNING 

nocturne  of  Fireworks  at  Vauxhall — said  it  was  the  finest  thing 
that  had  ever  been  done,  that  critics  pitched  into  it,  but  that  any 
tot  knew  it  was  fireworks — then  showed  a  pastel  of  a  girl  with  an 
umbrella — "a  classic" — asked  J.  to  come  again. 

J.  remembers  most  distinctly  other  details  of  that  visit.  He  remem 
bers  there  was  a  curry  for  lunch  because  it  was  the  first  he  ever 
tasted.  He  remembers  that  when  he  asked  Whistler  to  do  the 
drawings,  Whistler  said,  "I  can't,  but" — turning  to  Mortimer 
Menpes,  who  until  then  had  lingered  unseen  in  a  corner — "here's 
a  chance  for  you.  You  will  do  these  things."  "No,"  said  J.,  "if 
you  cannot,  why,  I'll  do  them  myself."  And  from  that  moment 
they  began  to  get  on  terms.  We  know  now  it  was  because  of  this 
speaking  up  to  Whistler  that  we  got  on  with  him  always — also 
because  we  were,  as  he  was,  real  Americans.  And  J.  remembers  it 
was  on  that  day  he  first  saw  the  Sarasate,  in  the  studio,  looming  up 
at  the  end  of  a  long  dark  passage  which  led  to  it,  looking  just  as 
Whistler  wanted  it  to  look,  as  if  the  violinist  were  standing  on  the 
darkened  stage.  Like  the  Meninas,  the  Sarasate  should  be  shown 
alone  in  a  properly  lighted  room.  J.  remembers  also  that  Whistler 
sent  him  that  afternoon  to  an  old  photographer  in  a  by-street  who 
had  photographs  of  some  of  his  pictures  and  also  views  of  Old 
Chelsea.  Then  Whistler  asked  him  to  come  to  his  show  being  held 
at  Dowdeswell's  in  Bond  Street — it  was  the  show  of  Notes,  Har 
monies,  Nocturnes,  1884,  in  which  were  many  of  his  Cornish 
sketches — but  J's.  memories  of  that  first  summer  in  London,  so 
crowded  with  new  adventures  and  new  impressions,  are  all  con 
fused.  One,  however,  stands  out  with  greater  vividness,  the 
memory  of  the  day  when,  going  into  Charing  Cross  Station,  he 
saw  Whistler  at  the  book-stall,  the  only  time  he  ever  saw  him  in 
his  long  frock  coat,  white  trousers,  and  top  hat,  carrying  his  long 
cane,  and  J.  did  not  like  his  looks  and  avoided  him. 
At  this  period,  and  during  the  greater  part  of  his  life,  when  he  was 
in  the  studio  at  work,  Whistler  looked  not  unlike  an  old-fashioned 
American  barkeeper  because  he  wore  a  white  waistcoat  with 
sleeves  which  all  bar-keepers  used  to  wear,  and  also  because  he  had 
the  thick  curly  hair  which  many  of  them  cultivated.  They  juggled 
with  glasses,  a  lost  art  in  this  home  of  hypocrites;  he  mastered 
paint,  as  every  artist  thinks  he  has  in  this  land  of  artless  imitation. 
We  have  seen  an  oil  portrait  of  him  by  himself  in  this  costume.  But 
after  his  wife's  death  he  added  a  black  coat  over  the  white  jacket. 

1880-1885]  5 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Out  of  the  studio  and  in  the  street  he  dressed  for  some  years  as 
J.  saw  him  at  Charing  Cross.  If  he  changed,  it  was  probably  for 
something  more  exaggerated.  G.  A.  Holmes,  a  Chelsea  artist,  is 
one  among  many  from  whom  we  have  heard  of  this  side  of  Whistler 
and  of  the  variations  in  dress  he  invented.  He  remembered  "the 
day  I  sauntered  up  Pall  Mall  with  Whistler  who  wore  a  flat- 
brimmed  top  hat,  long  black  frock  coat,  white  waistcoat  and  white 
trousers,  and  carried  the  long  stick,  and — well — some  people  did 
observe  him."  Frederick  Jameson,  with  whom  Whistler  shared  a 
studio  for  almost  a  year,  put  these  exaggerations  down  to  Whistler's 
gaiety  and  fun  which  gave  him  a  new  idea  of  life,  he  said,  of  what 
life  might  be.  It  was  this  sense  of  fun  above  all  that  made  Whistler 
do  the  astonishing  things  he  did,  and  Jameson  delighted  in  the 
memory  of  him  walking  out  with  two  umbrellas,  one  white  and  one 
black,  and  his  explanation  that  the  black  was  in  case  it  rained,  and 
the  white  in  case  the  sun  shone.  The  joy  was  malicious  when  he 
returned  from  Venice  wearing  the  coat  with  a  cape  he  had  bought 
there:  as  great  a  sensation  in  Bond  Street  galleries  as  among  Sack- 
ville  Street  tailors.  He  posed  in  it  to  photographers  and  to  Mr. 
Menpes,  as  if  bent  on  handing  down  the  joy  to  future  generations. 
But  when  convention  required  it  he  could  be  as  conventional  as 
anyone.  In  these  matters  he  had  a  sense  of  appropriateness.  Cir 
cumstances  made  the  difference  in  his  dress  just  as  he  felt  age  did 
in  the  appearance  of  Napoleon  who,  he  said,  "was  quite  right  when 
young  and  struggling  for  success  to  have  long  wild  hair  and  thin 
haggard  face,  and  equally  right,  when  older  and  success  had  come, 
to  be  smooth  and  sleek  and  develop  a  corporation." 
This  Whistler  of  the  strange  costumes  was  the  man  the  world  got 
to  know  through  Ape's  and  Spy's  cartoons  and  later,  in  a  garbled 
version,  through  the  numerous  caricatures  of  Mortimer  Menpes 
and  Walter  Greaves,  too  exaggerated  to  be  authentic;  also  from 
the  Chase  portrait,  now  in  the  Metropolitan  Museum,  painted  the 
summer  after  we  came  to  London.  The  impression  Whistler's 
dress  made  on  those  who  did  not  know  him  was  "startling."  We 
have  heard  from  Emil  Claus  how  it  struck  Constantin  Meunier. 
Claus,  with  other  Belgian  artists,  was  in  London  during  the  War 
which  he  tried  to  forget  by  recalling  the  past.  Dining  with  us 
one  evening,  he  began  to  talk  of  Meunier  whom  he  described  as 
simple  in  manner  and  dress  and  every  other  way.  He  had  gone 
once  to  Paris  with  Meunier  for  the  Salons,  but,  he  happened  to  be 
alone  at  the  Champ-de-Mars  when  he  saw  a  curious  figure  with 
flat-brimmed  hat — chapeau  calicot — and  monocle  and  of  many 

6  [1880-1885 


WHISTLER  ABOUT  THE  TIME  OF  HIS 
RETURN  FROM   VENICE 

Photograph  by  Mendelsohn 
Loaned  by  Burton  Mansfield,  Esq. 


PORTRAIT  BY  CARLO  PELLEGRINI, 
"APE" 


CHELSEA 


Th»  no.rlv    new 


Ebonized  &  gilt  Drawing  Room  Suite 

«t  MC  JAPAl 1  CiBIMif , 

JAPANIBB  SCREEN, 

COTTAGE  PIANOFORTE 

J*    ««)»•<    »K,     bj    T««kl«.o»,    CAKVJED     O«iX     P A V KN FORT,     '•«*  «<"'    O«-«»»l««»)    T.blw,    »>•<«••    aod  »rt>  of  F.ln    Ir«»», 

Turkey  pile  and  Persian   Carpets,  TEST    VALUABLE    COLLECTION  of 

NANKIN  &  OTHER  CHINA 

'  EASELS,    ' 

Fittings  of  Din  ins;  ROOM,  Japanese  Camphorwood  Cabinet, 

MAHOQANT    SET    OF    DINING    TABLIS, 

\  Al.l  A  lll.i:    <  01,1,1^  TIO\     01 

OIL  PAINTINGS 

ffllchitif/x  and  Drawings* 

XTCBXNO   PUkTKS    J«p.».-...  »<  CM»«M>  u~k.t   OBNAMKNTAI.  ITEMH,   j.p«.,.,    ii.ti,, 

THE  APPENDAGES  OF  BED  CHAMBERS 

l»f     »fS»»TBA»H     ..4     IIKDUIX.,      M.k.(m.;    Ck«.U  .r    I»f.wen.     VTuMu*.  •»*  tnt&lf,  »k.w«r  B««*  *»*  C«rUH«., 

100  Ois.  SUver  Plated  irtteles 

C.ilfrj,   l.i.r..  <  ki«.  u<  «law,  «»««l  C.ll»«rj  DlewlK  .«<  ctkor  t*~i.. 

WIIHI1     WILI/  HK    «>IJ>     B%'     AUCTION,     BY     MESSRS. 

NEWTON 


On   the   Premises   of    Mr. 

WHITE    HOUSE,"    TITE    STREET,    CHELSEA, 

On  WEDNESDAY,  MAY  7th,  1879 


69,    CHANCERY    I*&NE 


POSTER  OP  THE  SALE  AT  THE  WHITE  HOUSE 
PROOF 

On  the  premises  of  Mr.  Whistler  omitted  from  poster  used.       Pennell  Collection,  Library  of 

Congress,  Washington 


THE  BEGINNING 

poses.  He  asked  who  it  was,  and  was  told,  "Vistlaire."  That 
evening  he  and  Meunier  were  at  the  Cafe  Napolitain.  The  same 
curious  figure  appeared,  stood  a  minute  at  the  door,  the  flat- 
brimmed  hat  down  over  his  eyes,  in  his  hand  a  tall  slender  stick. 
Everyone  stared.  To  Meunier,  who  was  staring  with  the  rest, 
Claus  whispered  "Vistlaire!"  Meunier  said  "C'est  dommage!"  and 
that  was  all.  Had  Whistler  sat  down  and  talked,  Meunier  would 
have  forgotten  the  flat-brimmed  hat  and  the  long  stick  and  the 
pose,  and  been  conscious  only  of  the  artist.  That  was  always  the 
way  with  those  who  could  understand.  But  we  wonder  whether, 
that  evening,  Meunier  was  wearing  his  sweater  and  his  beret  in 
which  he  also  liked  to  pose  for  the  photographer?  Both  were 
artists,  and  that  is  all  there  is  about  it. 

Confused  as  J's.  memories  are  of  our  first  year  in  London,  we  have 
nothing  else  to  depend  on  and,  at  least,  they  are  fuller  than  that 
earliest  of  all  the  note-books,  in  which  there  is  but  one  other  refer 
ence  to  Whistler,  and  it  is  vaguer  still: — 

Monday,  August  nth,  1884.  After  lunch  at  the  Holborn,  went  to 
Chelsea.  J.  P.  made  a  sketch  from  the  bridge.  I  wandered  and 
watched  a  boat-race  which  had  crowded  the  Embankment.  After  it 
was  over,  walked  about  Chelsea.  Saw  Rossetti's  house  and  Turner's 
and  the  one  Whistler  used  to  live  in.  Then  home  by  the  steamboat. 

"The  one  Whistler  used  to  live  in"  was  the  White  House  where 
his  stay  six  years  before  had  been  cut  tragically  short  by  the  Ruskin 
case  and  the  bankruptcy.  An  empty,  bare  little  note  this,  not  a 
word  in  it  as  to  the  look,  the  condition  of  the  house,  only  interesting 
for  the  reference  to  the  penny  steamboat  on  the  Thames,  one  of 
the  London  joys  of  those  old  days  gone  forever. 
There  is  no  mention  of  Whistler  after  this  until  several  months  had 
passed  and  we  were  in  Venice  where  Whistler  was  the  hero  of  the 
cafes  and  trattorias  Duveneck  introduced  us  to.  It  was  little 
more  than  four  years  since  Whistler,  in  his  wide-brimmed  hat  and 
flowing  tie,  penniless  and  waiting  for  payment,  watched  over  by 
Maud,  tireless,  working  from  dawn  to  dusk,  had  become  a  rival 
of  Duveneck  with  the  "Boys,"  and  created  the  Whistler  Legend. 
But  the  Venetian  note-book  has  disappeared  for  the  moment,  gone 
astray  in  the  chaos  of  breaking-up  our  Adelphi  Terrace  flat  and 
ending  our  thirty-four  years'  life  in  London — another  of  the  little 
horrors  of  the  great  useless  war. 
1880-1885]  7 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

This  brings  us  to  our  return  to  England  in  the  late  spring  of  1885 — 
shortly  after  Whistler  delivered  the  Ten  O'Clock  which  we  never 
heard — and  to  our  settling  down  in  London,  and  the  days  when  we 
not  only  listened  to  Whistler  stories  and  looked  at  his  work,  but 
got  to  know  him,  the  knowing  gradually  growing  with  the  years 
into  friendship  and  intimacy. 


CHAPTER  II.  THE  BEGINNING  CONTINUED.  GETTING 
TO  KNOW  WHISTLER  BETTER.  THE  YEARS  EIGHTEEN 
EIGHTY-FIVE  TO  EIGHTEEN  NINETY-SEVEN 

WE  have  no  notes  of  Whistler  for  1885,  the  summer  of  our 
return  to  London,  but  many  memories.  It  was  the  summer 
that  Whistler  and  Chase  were  painting  each  other:  Whistler  mak 
ing  Chase  "beautiful  on  canvas,  the  Masher  of  the  Avenues,"  but 
the  portrait  never  seen  since;  Chase  making  the  weak  caricature 
now  at  the  Metropolitan  which  could  so  much  more  easily  have 
been  spared.  As  time  went  on,  J.  began  to  run  across  Whistler 
occasionally  at  private  views  and  galleries  and  functions,  but  it 
was  not  until  Henley  and  The  Scots,  changed  to  National,  Observer, 
came  up  to  London  in  1892  that  he  saw  much  of  Whistler  and 
learned  to  understand  him. 

Before  this,  however,  an  incident  in  connection  with  The  Scots 
Observer  had  been  the  cause  of  a  second  meeting,  and  a  very  friendly 
one.  Sir  Hubert  von  Herkomer  published  the  libretto  and  music 
of  his  play  An  Idyl,  and  he  illustrated  it  with  pen  drawings,  repro 
duced  by  photogravure  and  faked  up  with  a  little  dry  point,  which 
he  tried  to  sell  as  etchings.  J.  wrote  an  open  letter  to  the  eminent 
professor,  in  The  Scots  Observer  saying  frankly  what  he  thought  of 
the  professor's  proceedings.  In  doing  so  he  was  supported  not 
only  by  Henley,  the  editor,  who  was  keenly  sympathetic,  but  by 
Seymour  Haden,  though,  naturally,  Haden  went  back  on  him  as 
soon  as  he  heard  that  Whistler  also  was  supporting  J.  Whistler's 
support  was  active.  He  wrote  a  letter  to  The  Scots  Observer  con 
demning  Herkomer,  who  there  upon,  or  shortly  after,  retired  from 
the  Slade  Professorship,  as  Ruskin  had  previously  retired  when 
Whistler  annihilated  him,  and  Herkomer  disappeared  as  an  etcher. 
This  took  J.  to  Whistler's  at  21  Cheyne  Walk,  the  only  time  he 
was  there.  He  remembers  that  the  house  down  stairs,  which  was 
all  he  saw  of  it,  looked  as  if  it  was  just  being  moved  into  or  out  of. 
There  were  no  pictures,  only  packing  cases  about,  and  little  furni- 
8  [1885-1897 


*   »'|     "\          \^ 

f?  tyv '  \ 

(t<i  1.1t\£9- 


21   CHEYNE  WALK 

ETCHING 

By  Joseph  Pennell 


IN  THE  GARDEN  OF  SAME 

LITHOGRAPH.   W.   38 

The    print    contains    portraits    of    Walter    Sickert    standing, 
Brandon  Thomas  in  top  hat,  Charles  Whibley,  Mrs  Whistler, 

Miss  Ethel  Birnie  Philip  and  others 
By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


^* 


I  ^ 

V\ 


\ 


W.  E.  HENLEY 

LITHOGRAPH    W.     12? 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


GETTING  TO  KNOW  WHISTLER 

ture.  He  also  remembers  Mr.  Walter  Sickert  coming  in  and  being 
promptly  sent  out  to  post  a  letter,  for  in  those  days  Mr.  Sickert 
was  still  one  of  "the  Followers." 

Later,  when  we  were  all  mixed  up  with  The  National  Observer  and 
The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  J.  used  to  find  Whistler  in  Henley's  rooms 
and  Charles  Whibley's  flat — delightful  evenings  spent  in  both 
places — and  also  at  Solferino's,  the  little  restaurant  in  Rupert 
Street,  where  The  National  Observer  staff  and  The  Pall  Mall  crowd 
would  meet  and  Whistler  would  drop  in.  Presently  The  National 
Observer  men  began  to  give  themselves  dinners  in  an  upstairs  room, 
Henley  at  the  head  of  the  table,  on  one  side  Harry  Cust,  editor  of 
The  Pall  Mall,  on  the  other  Hamilton  Bruce,  proprietor  of  The 
National  Ob  server,  and  up  and  down  both  sides,  J.,  Arthur  Morrison, 
George  Steevens,  Bob  Stevenson,  Charles  Whibley,  Charles  Furse, 
J.  M.  Barrie,  Harold  Frederic.  And  once  in  a  while  some  one, 
Barrie  probably,  would  bring  Conan  Doyle,  though  what  he  was 
doing  there  it  would  be  hard  to  say,  unless  it  was  that  after  a 
certain  hour  in  the  evening  the  diners  would  make  bets  as  to  which 
was  Frederic  and  which  was  Doyle.  Sometimes  Whistler  would 
appear  and,  as  he  became  more  intimate  with  Whibley,  he  would 
go  oftener  to  Whibley's  rooms,  now  on  the  Embankment  at  Mill- 
bank.  There  was  brilliant  talk  and  some  of  the  things  we  have 
related  in  the  Life  occurred  at  Whibley's  and  at  Solferino's  and  at 
the  Hogarth  Club  where  also  Whistler  occasionally  went.  But  all 
this  is  vague.  J.  recalls  with  less  vagueness  the  night  Whistler 
had  promised  to  come  to  a  dinner  at  Solferino's  and  did  not  come 
on  time.  The  others  would  not  wait.  Instead,  his  empty  chair 
was  solemnly  asked,  "Mr.  Whistler,  will  you  have  some  of  this?" 
And  he  was  served  with  everything  from  the  soup,  one  course 
piled  in  the  plates  upon  another,  and  his  glasses  were  filled.  At 
last  he  arrived — with  dessert — was  shown  his  place,  took  it  all  in, 
and,  without  a  word,  ate  his  cold  dinner  backward.  Not  one  of 
them  dared  to  make  any  comments,  nor  did  he.  He  could  take  a 
joke  among  friends  who  were  really  his  friends. 
During  this  period  J.  began  to  write  a  column  on  art  signed  "Artist 
Unknown,"  for  The  Star,  succeeding  George  Bernard  Shaw  who  gave 
it  up  for  music,  or  socialism,  or  something  or  other,  and  at  the 
same  time  Bob  Stevenson,  whom  we  had  got  to  know  through 
Henley  and  Whibley,  did  the  art  criticism  for  The  Pall  Mall 
Gazette.  D.  S.  MacColl  had  just  come  up  to  London  and  George 
Moore  was  trying  to  chip  in,  writing  on  art  for  The  Speaker. 
MacColl  became  the  mouthpiece,  first  in  The  Spectator  and  then 
in  The  Saturday,  for  the  New  English  Art  Club  and,  as  Whistler 
1885-1897]  9 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

had  occasionally  shown  with  the  New  English,  "D.S.M."  reluc 
tantly  stood  by  him.  George  Moore  praised  and  then  qualified 
the  praise  and  never  understood,  as  Modern  Painting  amply 
proves.  But  J.  believed,  and  Stevenson  believed  in  Whistler's 
art  always,  and  they  wrote  about  it  always,  and  soon  the  triumph 
came  with  the  exhibition  of  Nocturnes,  Marines  and  Chevalet  Pieces 
arranged  by  D.  Croal  Thomson  in  1892  at  the  Goupil  Gallery. 
Mr.  Thomson  told  us  years  later  how  he  brought  it  about.  The 
Carlyle  had  been  bought  for  Glasgow,  and  shown  at  Goupil's  where 
all  London  crowded  to  see  it.  Thomson,  rejoicing  in  its  success, 
said  to  Whistler  that  the  time  had  come  to  make  really  an  exhibi 
tion.  "Of  what?"  asked  Whistler.  "You  know  what  I  mean," 
was  Thomson's  answer,  "we  can't  do  anything  with  pastels  and 
water  colours.  We  have  got  beyond  etchings  and  lithographs 
which  have  been  often  exhibited.  It  must  be  pictures."  And 
pictures  it  was,  and,  the  decision  reached,  Whistler  spared  no  pains 
to  get  together  a  representative  series.  It  began  with  early  paint 
ings,  The  Blue  Wave,  Old  Battersea  Bridge,  The  Music  Room.  It 
included  the  Japanese  subjects.  It  gloried  in  portraits  of  many 
periods,  from  the  Miss  Alexander  to  the  Lady  Meux.  It  found  a 
place  for  some  of  the  most  beautiful  nocturnes.  Never  before  had 
there  been  so  magnificent  a  proof  of  Whistler's  mastery  and  variety. 
Whistler  looked  in  for  a  minute  at  the  press  view.  The  room  was 
crowded  with  the  critics  who  had  come  to  laugh  and  remained  to 
try  to  toady.  There  they  were,  Humphry  Ward  of  The  Times; 
Sala  or  Claude  Phillips  of  The  Telegraph — it  was  only  a  change  of 
names;  Wedmore  of  The  Standard,  whose  critical  record  will  re 
main  in  Whistler's  brown-paper-covered  catalogues;  Walter 
Sickert  who  ceased  to  be  a  "Follower"  to  become  one  of  the 
"Enemies";  Stephens  of  The  Athenceum\  and  all  the  rest.  The 
enthusiasm  was  great,  but  Whistler  never  forgot,  and  the  almost 
universal  praise  next  day  in  the  papers  could  not  wipe  out  the  past 
and  the  old  empty  ridicule.  But  on  private  view  day  Whistler, 
taking  Bob  Stevenson  and  J.  away  into  Mr.  Croal  Thomson's 
little  curtained-off  room,  said  nothing  about  what  they  had  done  for 
the  exhibition  but  told  them  that  he  had  just  heard  of  the  death  of 
the  Duke  of  Marlborough,  who  had  wanted  to  be  painted  by  him 
and  had  invited  him  and  Mrs.  Whistler  to  Blenheim,  where,  the 
Duke  wrote,  they  would  "  all  work  like  niggers."  "  Well,  you  know," 
Whistler  said,  "I  accepted  the  commission,  the  first  of  that  sort 
I  ever  had,  and  I  wrote  him  so — one  of  my  charming  letters — and 
now  I  shall  never  know  whether  my  letter  killed  him,  or  whether 
he  died  before  he  got  it.  Well,  they  all  want  to  be  painted  now, 
10  [1885-1897 


SMALL    COLLECTION 

OF 

NOCTURNES 
MARINES  &.  CHEVALET  PIECES 

BY 

MR.   WHISTLER 
THE  GOUPIL  GALLERIES 

FOR 

THREE     WEEKS    ONLY 


M    "•      !in(  s^ol)    \  ALASKA    \    Co 

lift    £•    117    NT.W    150X1)  STREET 


March  21  to  April  9 


j 

POSTER  FOR  EXHIBITION  OF  NOCTURNES,  MARINES  AND  CHEVALET  PIECES 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


•— «rfi  ., 

.u^^T  ;•;    ||  ^ 

' 


LATE  PIQUETTE 

LITHOGRAPH.  W.  57 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


-•£>: 


m. 


£ 


STEPHANE    MALLARME 

LITHOGRAPH.    W.  66 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


THE  DUET 

LITHOGRAPH    (UNDESCRIBED) 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


(See  page  12) 


GETTING  TO  KNOW  WHISTLER 

but  why  wouldn't  they  be  painted  years  ago  when  I  wanted  to 
paint  them  and  could  have  painted  them  just  as  well?"  Whistler's 
comment  upon  the  Duke's  death  is  not  unlike.his  complaint  when, 
after  one  of  his  "most  amazing  letters"  to  Sergeant  Thomas, 
his  publisher,  "What  did  Thomas  do  but  die  by  return  of  post!" 
It  is  worth  noting  that  the  Duke  was  to  have  given  Whistler  two 
thousand  guineas  for  the  portrait  which,  it  was  agreed,  would  be  a 
large  full-length,  or,  if  Whistler  would  also  paint  the  Duchess, 
three  thousand  pounds  for  the  two  portraits: — the  new  prices  that 
the  turn  in  the  tide  of  his  fortunes  brought  with  it.  This  shows 
that  the  Duke  of  Marlborough  had  courage,  especially  as  he  seems 
to  have  shared  the  popular  idea  of  Whistler,  the  man.  "You  must 
stick  to  painting  and  give  up  writing  letters  about  R.A's.  and 
A.R.A's.,"  is  the  condescending  advice  with  which  the  letter  ends. 
From  the  Goupil  Gallery  J.  went  on  with  Whistler  and  Bob  Steven 
son  to  the  Arts  Club,  to  which  Whistler  then  belonged,  to  Sol- 
ferino's  to  dinner,  then  to  the  Savile  Club  of  which  Stevenson  was 
a  member,  and  very  late  they  sent  Whistler  home  in  a  hansom, 
wondering  if  he  had  money  enough  to  pay  for  it.  J.  does  not 
remember  what  he  talked  about  all  evening  save  that  much  was 
said  of  the  new  flat  in  Paris  to  which  he  was  moving.  He  was 
serious,  for  it  was  a  serious  occasion — this  moment  of  triumph  or, 
rather,  the  beginning  of  his  triumph — and  he  took  it  seriously. 
It  was  too  serious  for  talk.  But  he  knew  perfectly  well  and  proved 
that  he  knew,  who  were  the  two  men  who  had  helped  to  bring  it 
about  by  making  evident  what  he  had  done.  And  that  afternoon 
J's.  intimacy  with  Whistler  began. 

Some  months  later,  J.  was  going  somewhere  on  the  Continent  and 
stopped  in  Paris.  Whistler  had  not  got  into  the  flat  but  was  stay 
ing  at  the  Hotel  du  Bon  Lafontaine — "inhabited  by  the  nobility 
and  clergy."  he  used  to  say — and  there  J.  found  him  drawing  the 
portrait  of  Mallarme  for  the  frontispiece  of  Fers  et  Prose.  This 
little  drawing  marked  a  new  departure  in  the  art  of  lithography. 
Instead  of  using  the  sticky  brittle  German  transfer  paper,  he  laid 
a  sheet  of  thin  Japanese  tracing  paper  on  a  rough  book  cover  and 
drew  on  it,  shifting  the  paper  as  he  drew  to  get  a  varying  grain. 
But  before  he  got  the  result  he  wanted,  he  made  many  drawings. 
Lithographers  have  usually  discussed  the  difficulties  of  their  art, 
Whistler  overcame  them  before  he  spoke  of  them.  J.  thinks  it 
was  that  evening,  when  Mallarme  was  tired  posing,  that  Whistler, 
gayer  than  ever,  took  J.  to  the  little  restaurant,  more  like  an 
English  chop-house  with  its  sort  of  boxes,  in  the  Passage  des 
Panoramas,  much  haunted  by  Duret,  Drouet,  Beurdeley,  Viele- 
1885-1897]  II 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Griffin,  the  last  of  whom  alone  was  there  that  evening  and  it  was 
the  only  time  J.  ever  met  the  New  Orleans  French  poet.  The  next 
day  Whistler  showed  J.  the  new  flat  in  the  Rue  du  Bac.  And  then 
they  went  their  ways. 

The  following  spring — -1893 — J.  returned  to  Paris  to  make  drawings 
of  Notre-Dame  for  our  book  on  The  French  Cathedrals.  To  the 
top  of  the  tower  Whistler  toiled  to  find  him  one  morning  after  he 
had  climbed  in  vain  to  the  top  of  the  house  on  the  Quai-des-Grands- 
Augustins,  where  J.  was  staying,  drawing  out  of  the  windows,  and 
where,  in  the  cafe  downstairs,  Whistler  wrote  his  disappointment 
at  not  finding  him  to  J.,  one  of  his  earliest  letters  to  either  of  us. 
Over  lunch,  under  the  shadow  of  Notre-Dame,  he  explained  that 
he  wanted  J.  to  help  with  his  printing — he  was  biting  and  printing 
the  last  Paris  plates  which  no  one  had  seen.  This  was  arranged, 
though  only  after  endless  postponements  and  after  J.  finally  said 
that  he  knew  Whistler  could  teach  him  just  what  he  wanted  to 
know,  but  he  could  not  afford  to  spend  his  time  running  about 
Paris,  lunching  and  dining  instead,  even  with  Whistler.  At  once 
the  printing  began  and  the  friendship  became  more  intimate  and 
its  terms  better  understood. 

For  weeks  in  the  summer  of  1893,  either  at  the  printing  press  in 
the  Rue  Notre-Dame-des-Champs  or  at  the  Rue  du  Bac,  J.  was 
with  Whistler  almost  daily.  Work  stopped  on  the  Sunday  after 
noons,  when  sometimes  all  the  world  came  to  Whistler's  and  some 
times  no  one  came.  And  there  were  excursions  to  all  sorts  of  places, 
from  St.  Denis  to  Fontainebleau.  It  was  the  summer  of  the  Sarah 
Brown  row  when  the  whole  of  Paris  was  upset  by  the  students' 
rising  over  which  everybody  went  mad,  except  Whistler  who 
thought  it  absurd.  It  was  the  summer  when  Whistler  signed  his 
will  and  J.  witnessed  it.*  And  it  was  the  summer  when  Beardsley 
was  in  Paris  getting  the  backgrounds  for  The  Rape  of  the  Lock, 
and  when  one  night,  coming  away  from  Tristan  and  Isolde  at  the 
Opera,  which  gave  him  his  motive  for  The  Wagnerites,  and  crossing 
the  street  to  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix,  he  and  J.  found  Whistler  there 
and  J.  had  Beardsley  asked  to  the  Rue  du  Bac.  But  this  was 
before  The  Rape  drawings  were  published,  and  Whistler's  feeling 
for  him  was  anything  rather  than  friendly.  "Why  do  you  go  with 
him?"  Whistler  said.  "He  has  hairs  on  his  hands,  hairs  on  his 
finger  ends,  hairs  in  his  ears,  hairs  on  his  toes,  hairs  all  over  him." 
Yet  Whistler  asked  Beardsley  for  the  next  Sunday  afternoon,  prom 
ised  to  dine  with  him  and  never  turned  up. 

*  NOTE — He  later  made  another  will,  a  copy  of  which  is  in  the  Pennell  Collection, 

Library  of  Congress,  which  I  did  not  sign. 

12  [1885-1897 


MISS  MILDRED  HOWELLS 

LITHOGRAPH.  W.  75 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


;-ti!ii^  $Hfe^ 

; Vs,--.v  *p«  .  _v  M  TOgg&SSS? 

'T/-    \\v!  t         "H 


MOTHER  AND   DAUGHTER 

LITHOGRAPH       (UNDESCRIBED) 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


GETTING  TO  KNOW  WHISTLER 

In  the  beginning  of  May  E.  also  was  in  Paris,  doing  the  two  Salons. 
She  has  no  memories  of  Whistler,  even  vague,  during  the  years 
between  1885  and  1893  when  J.  was  often  seeing  him,  and  she  has 
no  notes,  her  diary  having  long  since  been  given  up  as  impossible 
to  fit  into  her  busy  life.  It  still  seems  strange  to  her  why  she  never 
met  Whistler,  never  so  much  as  saw  him,  for  she  too  did  more  than 
one  weekly  column  on  art  and  was  much  at  exhibitions,  galleries 
and  art  functions.  But  her  first  meeting  was  in  May  1893,  when 
Whistler,  learning  that  we  were  in  Paris,  asked  us  both  to  Sunday 
breakfast  in  the  Rue  du  Bac.  She  remembers  the  walk  with  J. 
and  MacColl  across  the  Seine  and  up  the  long  street  in  the  May 
sunshine,  finding  the  big  porte-cochere  of  No.  no  and  the  dark 
passage  that  led  to  the  bright  little  courtyard,  and  the  blue  and 
white  door  in  the  sunlight  at  the  end,  and  the  welcome  they 
received  from  Whistler.  The  breakfast  was  gay.  Mrs.  Whistler 
presided  and,  besides  ourselves  and  MacColl,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Edwin 
Abbey  were  there.  It  was  the  day  he  told  us  the  story  of  the 
babies  at  Liverpool — which  we  have  told  in  the  Life — and  the 
breakfast  was  something  to  remember:  the  beautiful  blue-and- 
white,  the  good  wine  from  some  Abbe's  cellar,  the  Argenteuil 
asparagus,  the  strawberries  in  a  little  silver  basket  at  each 
guest's  place. 

After  this,  E.  saw  Whistler  often.  She  was  never  in  Paris  that 
she  did  not  breakfast  or  dine  at  the  Rue  du  Bac.  She  recalls 
delightfully  an  autumn  when  she  arrived  after  two  nights  and  a 
day  in  the  train  from  Madrid,  travel-worn,  travel-soiled,  her 
baggage  on  its  way  to  England,  and  she  was  taken  in  as  if  she 
were  spick  and  span  and  could  treat  dinner  as  the  formal  event 
Whistler  always  made  it.  And  this  time  there  was  a  new  flat  to 
see,  in  the  Rue  Garanciere,  just  being  decorated  for  Mrs.  Whistler's 
sister,  Ethel  Birnie  Philip  who  was  shortly  to  marry  Charles 
Whibley.  This  was  in  the  autumn  of  1894.  J.  had  been  all  spring 
and  summer,  first  in  Italy  and  then  in  Spain  and  for  him  there 
were  no  meetings  with  Whistler,  who  was  indignant  because,  on 
his  return  from  Spain,  he  rushed  through  Paris  "in  such  improper 
haste."  Whistler  wanted  to  hear  about  his  feelings  when  he 
looked  at  Velasquez  "whom  we  have,  you  know,  never  seen." 
This  statement  of  Whistler's  in  a  letter  to  us  demolishes  all  the 
ridiculous  stories  of  his  mysterious  appearances  in  Madrid  where 
he  never  went. 

J.  was  home  again  by  the  end  of  October,  and  Whistler,  whenever 
in  London,  began  to  come  to  us  in  our  Buckingham  Street  cham 
bers.  But  he  was  not  in  London  often  until  the  tragedy  of  Mrs. 
1885-1897]  13 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Whistler's  Illness  compelled  him  to  be  there.  The  day  of  her  first 
consultation  with  her  English  doctor,  late  in  1894,  E.  must  always 
remember,  for  Whistler  kept  her  to  lunch  with  them  at  Long's 
Hotel  in  Bond  Street,  where  they  were  staying,  and,  in  his  nervous 
ness,  would  not  let  her  go  afterwards  while  the  Doctor  was  with 
Mrs.  Whistler — would  have  had  her  still  with  him  when  the  Doctor 
gave  his  report. 

We  have  already  told  in  the  Life  how  much  he  was  in  our  place 
from  this  time  on,  when  he  and  Mrs.  Whistler  were  coming  and 
going  between  London  and  Paris,  to  Lyme  Regis,  back  again  to 
London,  and  from  one  hotel  to  another.  Almost  every  afternoon 
or  evening  he  spent  with  us  during  the  last  months  of  her  illness. 
It  was  then,  when,  tired  from  a  night  of  watching  and  hardly 
refreshed  by  a  morning  of  sleeping,  he  would  come  to  Buckingham 
Street  in  the  waning  afternoon,  that  he  lithographed  our  portraits 
by  the  nickering  firelight.  The  afternoon  he  was  making  the 
lithograph  of  The  Russian  Schube,  he  told  J.  he  had  taken  a  studio 
in  Fitzroy  Street  that  he  might  paint  the  same  subject.  He  said 
nothing  to  J.  about  this  until  the  studio  was  taken,  and  then  J. 
had  to  tell  Whistler  that  he  must  leave  for  Italy.  Sadly,  Whistler 
said,  "Well,  I  thought  some  gallery — the  Pennsylvania  Academy, 
what? — would  have  bought  it  and  you  and  I  might  have  been 
remembered  by  it." 

J.  was  somewhere  in  France  when  Mrs.  Whistler  died,  on  May 
loth,  1896,  and  E.  was  in  Paris,  at  the  Salons.  On  the  Saturday 
following  the  funeral  E.  returned  and  more  than  sad  is  her  memory 
of  the  next  day,  Sunday,  when  in  the  afternoon  Whistler  appeared 
in  Buckingham  Street,  and  asked  her  to  come  with  him  to  the 
National  Gallery.  And  sad  are  many  of  our  memories  of  the  years 
that  followed,  though,  little  by  little  as  they  passed,  Whistler's 
sadness  lifted.  Gradually,  we  had  the  people  we  knew  would 
amuse  him  to  dine  with  him,  and  wonderful  were  the  long  evenings 
and  the  long  talks. 

His  days  were  full  not  only  of  work,  but  of  many  schemes.  For 
these  were  the  years  of  the  founding  of  the  International  Society 
of  Sculptors,  Painters  and  Gravers,  out  of  which  some  of  the 
English  members  tried  to  keep  J.  until  Whistler  made  it  a  condi 
tion  that  either  J.  should  be  on  the  Council,  or  he  would  go.  And 
so  this  time  it  was  the  British  who  went  out  and  Whistler  and  J. 
remained,  backed  by  the  Scotch,  the  Irish,  the  German,  the  Scandi 
navian,  and  the  French — Guthrie,  Lavery,  Sauter,  Thaulow, 
Blanche.  The  Society  really  was  International,  and  they  brought 
it  off.  And  these  were  the  years  when  we  were  all  busy  over  the 
14  [1885-1897 


1 


STUDY  PORTRAIT  OF  JOSEPH  PENNELL  THE  RUSSIAN  SCHUBB 

LITHOGRAPH.  W.  Ill  LITHOGRAPH.  W.  112 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


THE    DAILY   CHRONICLE,    FRIDAY,    JlHSE  IS,   189TJ 


MR.     WHISTLER     ON     THE    JUBILEE    STANDS. 


riHtvr(»;)^)-<*  ***•'*• " 


The  above  amusing  sketch  is  Kr.  Whistler's  contribution  to  the  "Great  JubUee  Stand"  problem. 


_LLAW  INTeLlTGENCE.    1      POLICE  INTEI  n^jy^a. 


NELSON  BOARDED  AT  LAST 
Reproduction  from  The  Daily  Chronicle 


NOT  KNOWN  AT  THE  ROYAL  ACADEMY 

Reproduction  from  T/ze  Daily  Mail. 
Originals  in  Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


WHISTLER    MAKING    A    LITHOGRAPH 
AT  WAY'S 

LITHOGRAPH  BY  T.  R.  WAY 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  T.  R.  Way 


PORTRAIT  OP  THOMAS  WAY 

LITHOGRAPH.   W.    IO? 

By  permission  of  Messrs.   Kennedy  and   Co. 


GETTING  TO  KNOW  WHISTLER 

Lithograph  Case,  caused  by  Walter  Sickert  and  an  article  he  wrote 
in  The  Saturday  Review,  to  injure  not  so  much  J.  as  Whistler. 
Although  Whistler  was  more  eager  for  it  than  J.,  he,  like  the  rest 
of  us,  was  sick  of  it  long  before  the  trial,  so  sick  that  the  morning 
before  he  came  to  say  he  would  not  attend  as  a  witness.  "  The 
case  is  as  much  yours  as  mine,  and  you  must  come,"  J.  said. 
"Your  reputation  is  involved.  There  will  be  an  end  to  your 
lithography  if  we  lose.  You  must  fight."  And  he  came,  and  we 
won.  And  time  was  still  left  in  these  years  for  afternoons  of  work 
ing  at  Way's,  lingering  to  give  a  last  touch  to  a  drawing,  or  to 
drink  a  last  glass  of  Way's  rare  old  liqueurs — "All  very  delightful," 
Way  would  grumble,  "but  hardly  business;"  time  for  making 
lithographs  round  London,  when  he  would  go  out  in  his  flat- 
brimmed  hat  and  long  overcoat,  and  on  the  London  sidewalk  seat 
himself  on  his  tiny  three-legged  sketching  stool  and  work  away  on 
his  little  sheets  of  paper;  time  too  for  starting  the  school  in  Paris, 
the  Academic  Carmen,  and  to  establish  in  London  the  Company 
of  the  Butterfly,  which  was  to  be  his  own  incubator  for  his  own 
golden  eggs,  but  which  succeeded  chiefly  in  proving  to  him  that 
dealers  have  their  use.  It  was  a  nuisance  to  him  almost  to  the  end 
of  his  life,  his  landlord  pursuing  him  to  Corsica  with  bills  for  rent 
and  complaints  of  the  condition  of  the  outside  doorplate — the 
scheme  perfect  in  theory,  he  thought,  but  the  trouble  was,  he  had 
no  time  for  it.  — - 

One  of  these  years — 1897 — was  the  year  of  the  Jubilee,  when 
Whistler  went  with  the  Vanderbilts  on  their  yacht  to  the  Naval 
Review  and  delighted  all  London  with  his  drawing  of  Nelson 
Boarded  at  Last  for  The  Daily  Chronicle. 

He  had  begun  to  go  out  again,  his  first  appearance  in  public  being 
the  occasion  of  his  last  encounter  with  Haden  at  a  dinner  given 
by  the  Society  of  Illustrators,  in  celebration  of  the  publication  of 
a  volume  illustrated  by  the  Society,  which  brought  them  neither 
the  fame  nor  the  fortune  they  hoped  for.  It  was  called  The  London 
Garland  and  was  edited  by  W.  E.  Henley.  Both  Whistler  and 
Haden  were  Vice-Presidents  of  the  Society,  of  which  Sir  James 
Linton  was  President.  J.  induced  Whistler,  then  staying  at  Heine- 
mann's,  to  go  to  the  dinner,  which  was  at  the  Holborn  and,  being 
on  the  Committee,  he  went  to  the  restaurant  early  to  see  about 
the  seats.  What  was  his  horror  when  Haden  suddenly  arrived, 
though  not  expected.  There  was  nothing  to  do  but  to  put  him  on 
Linton's  right  at  the  high  table  where  he  belonged.  But  what 
was  to  be  done  with  Whistler?  The  two  had  not  met  for  probably 
half  a  century.  A  small  table  was  arranged  in  the  middle  of  the 
1885-1897]  15 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

room  and  at  the  head  of  it,  with  his  back  to  Haden,  J.  placed 
Whistler,  Heinemann  and  ourselves  on  either  side.  Whistler's 
reception  pleased  him  enormously,  and  J.  kept  Haden  safely  out 
of  the  way  until  dinner  was  announced.  But  both  seemed  to  feel 
that  something  was  happening,  though  at  first  neither  saw  the 
other.  As  Whistler  sat  down,  he  produced  two  or  three  eye-glasses 
from  his  pocket.  Still,  neither  saw  the  other.  The  soup  came. 
Some  one  said  something  to  Whistler  and  there  was  a  "Ha!  ha!" 
Haden  stopped,  his  spoon  in  his  hand?  dropped  it  in  his  plate,  and 
fled,  followed  by  another  "Hal  ha!"  and  J.  had  to  explain  to  Haden 
that  the  Committee  had  no  idea  he  was  coming,  or  he  would  have 
been  warned.  But  Haden,  too  furious  to  protest,  rushed  away 
without  a  word.  Whistler,  even  then,  gave  no  sign  that  he  saw 
Haden.  But  Haden  knew  the  restaurant  was  no  place  for  him. 
Later,  that  same  evening,  in  Heinemann's  rooms,  when  Whistler 
was  brewing  his  wonderful  grog  in  Heinemann's  wonderful  old  glass, 
J.  described  Haden's  flight  and  it  rounded  out  the  triumph  of  the 
evening.  The  dinner  was  long  remembered  by  the  illustrators  who 
could  appreciate  the  difference  between  the  two  men — "Haden 
running  and  Whistler  staying  and  enjoying  it,"  was  the  way  E.  J. 
Sullivan  put  it  years  afterwards,  and  he  recalled  Whistler's  speech 
which  kept  us  all  in  a  state  of  expectation  for  he  seemed  ever  on 
the  point  of  referring  to  the  incident,  only  to  steer  delicately 
away  from  it.* 

People  who  did  not  know  Whistler  were  sometimes  bewildered  by 
the  many  glasses  he  produced  at  times  from  his  pocket,  and  they 
invented  ingenious  reasons — none  more  ingenious  than  that  of 
Armand-Dayot,  Inspecteur  Generate  des  Beaux-Arts.  He  and 
Albert  Belleroche  were  breakfasting  with  us  one  day  when  the 
talk  turned  upon  Whistler,  whom  Armand-Dayot  met  but  once, 
at  a  dinner  given  by  Mrs.  Potter  Palmer.  He  sat  on  her  right, 
Whistler  on  her  left,  and  he  saw  Whistler  put  up  one  eye-glass 
after  another,  dropping  each  off  in  turn  into  his  right  hand,  as 
was  his  habit,  and  laying  it  on  the  table  by  his  place,  until  there 
was  quite  a  little  pile  on  the  cloth.  He  supposed,  seeing  this,  that 
Whistler  was  bothered  by  the  steam  which,  rising  from  his  plate, 
clouded  his  glass  and  he  preferred  putting  up  a  fresh  one  to  wiping 
it  off. 

During  Whistler's  frequent  and  long  visits  to  Heinemann  at  this 
period  there  were  other  strange  encounters — with  Beerbohm, 
Frank  Harris,  Shorter,  Rothenstein — how  he  hated  Jews!  En- 

*  NOTE. — For  the  beginning  of  Whistler's  quarrel  with  Haden,  see  the  authorized 
Life  of  Whistler,  sixth  edition,  page  75  and  seq. 

16  [1885-1897 


GETTING  TO  KNOW  WHISTLER 

counters  too  with  friends  when  he  proved  his  wonderful  mastery 
of  the  art  of  making  cocktails  and  toddies.  And  there  were  as 
many  encounters  in  our  flat,  few  more  memorable  than  those  with 
Timothy  Cole,  at  work  then  in  the  National  Gallery,  his  talk  of 
art  a  challenge  to  Whistler,  his  fads  and  fancies  a  continual  amuse 
ment,  his  gaiety  a  stimulant  until  it  culminated  one  night  in  Cole's 
masquerading  as  his  grandfather,  a  misunderstanding  at  the  front 
door,  and  confusion  and  regrets  for  us  all.  We  remember  J's. 
distress  as  host,  fearing  an  offence  to  Cole,  and  in  contrast  to  it 
Whistler's  irresponsibility  as  guest,  delighting  in  the  jest  and  the 
mistake  and  J's.  scruples,  improvising  out  of  it  an  Oratorio  motive: 
"How  is  the  old  man  his  grandfather — the  old  man — the  old  man — 
the  old  man — the  old  man — his  grandfather — his  grandfather — his 
grandfather" — chanting  it  over  and  over,  keeping  it  up  until  J. 
had  to  laugh  and  forget  his  worries. 

These  were  the  years  also  of  endless  meetings  at  Garlant's  Hotel 
or  in  our  own  place  with  Whistler  and  Mr.  E.  G.  Kennedy,  then 
the  head  of  Wunderlich's — now  Kennedy  and  Co. — and  Whistler's 
agent  and  good  friend,  who  had  bought  his  etchings  as  far  back  as 
the  Seventies  when  scarcely  anybody  else  thought  of  buying  them. 
The  meetings  in  London  were  broken  by  little  journeys,  the  gayest 
in  memory  to  Dieppe  when  Boldini  was  with  us  and  revealed  himself 
a  genius  in  practical  jokes  and  a  boy  in  the  fun  he  got  out  of  them: 
whispering  it  about  the  Hotel  that  we  were  Royalty,  though  in 
cycling  clothes  J.  and  E.  must  have  looked  curiously  un-Royal; 
letting  us  in  for  apartments  far  beyond  our  means;  appearing  and 
disappearing  from  our  side  with  remarkable  agility,  and  profiting 
by  his  disappearances  to  make  our  beds  pie-fashion,  hide  our 
combs  and  brushes,  scatter  our  belongings;  getting  up  in  the  night 
to  knock  madly  at  our  doors  and  frighten  us  out  of  sleep;  down 
stairs  at  dawn  and  away  to  Paris  before  our  wrath  over  our  bill, 
and  his  which  he  left  Whistler  to  pay,  could  fall  upon  him.  And 
Whistler,  through  all  his  nonsense,  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and 
Kennedy  paid. 

But  during  these  full  years  there  were  no  Whistler  notes,  great  as 
was  our  opportunity. 


1885-1897]  17 


CHAPTER  III:  THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL. 
THE  PRE-RAPHAELITES  AND  OTHERS.  THE  YEARS 
EIGHTEEN  NINETY-SEVEN  TO  EIGHTEEN  NINETY- 
EIGHT 

/"TVHAT  there  were  any  notes  before  our  Whistler  Journal  was 
A  begun  we  owe  to  Robert  Underwood  Johnson,  at  the  time 
Associate  Editor  of  The  Century.  In  the  late  summer  of  1897 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Johnson  passed  through  London  and  we  asked 
Whistler  to  meet  them  at  dinner.  Our  dinner-table  was  small, 
six  the  number  it  limited  us  to.  But  six  is  the  best  number  for 
talk,  and  there  must  have  been  good  talk  that  night.  For  Mr. 
Johnson  remembered  it  so  well  that,  on  his  return  to  New  York  a 
few  months  later,  he  wrote  us  from  The  Century  Office: 

T.          A ,        -r,  "December  6th,  1897. 

DEAR  MRS.  PENNELL, 

.  .  .  And  now  we  want  to  stake  out  another  claim  on  your  terri 
tory.  We  have  obtained  the  right  to  engrave  Boldini's  wonderful 
picture  of  Whistler,  and  we  wish  from  you  an  article  on  him  which 
shall  be  in  the  nature  of  a  record  of  such  of  his  table  talk  as  may 
be  of  public  interest,  with  all  sorts  of  picturesque  incidents  of  him, 
such  as  may  not  be  undignified  either  on  his  part  or  on  ours. 
Outside  of  the  range  of  his  whimsicality  and  the  objectionable 
side  of  his  career,  there  is  a  substantial  and  vital  body  of  artistic 
thought  and  criticism  which  it  would  be  useful  to  make  known. 
It  is  not  necessary  that  this  article  should  appear  during  his  life 
time,  and  we  particularly  wish  that  the  matter  should  not  be  men 
tioned  to  him — at  least  until  the  article  is  completed;  but  you  are 
in  a  position,  without  any  violation  of  hospitality,  to  make  record 
of  a  great  deal  that  is  interesting  and  properly  publishable  about 
his  artistic  life.  You  remember  his  saying  the  evening  we  were 
with  you  that  it  took  the  nouveaux  riches  a  long  time  'to  grow  up 
to  the  portraits  we  make  of  them.' 

Will  you  turn  this  over  in  your  mind  and  let  us  know  your  attitude 
toward  it?  What  we  want  to  feel  is  that  anything  you  may  have 
to  write,  now  or  hereafter,  will  come  to  us.  ... 

Very  sincerely  yours, 

R.  U.  JOHNSON." 

18  [1897-1898 


PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER 

OIL 

By  J.  Boldini,  Brooklyn  Museum 


PORTRAIT  MADE  WHILE  WHISTLER  POSED  TO   BOLDINI 

DRY-POINT 

By  Paul  Helleu.     Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


WHISTLER  SLEEPING 

DRY-POINT 

Done  between  poses  in  Boldini's  studio.     By  J.  Boldini. 
In  the  possession  of  E.  G.  Kennedy,  Esq. 


WHISTLER     IN     HIS  PARIS  STUDIO 

Showing  the  screen  with  Battersea  Bridge  made  for  Leyland 

PHOTOGRAPH 

By  Dornac. 


(See  pages  12  and  302) 


THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL 

Mr.  Johnson's  letter  reveals  better  than  he  could  have  realized 
what  the  American  cultured  public's  feeling  about  Whistler  still 
was,  much  as  it  had  been  obliged  to  modify  its  opinion  about  his 
work — though  the  American  public  has  no  opinion  of  its  own  any 
longer,  thinking  and  -saying  only  what  it  is  taught  or  told  to.  To 
those  who  did  not  know  him  he  had  not  ceased  to  be  "whimsical," 
"of  objectionable  career,"  his  "want  of  dignity"  making  it  ques 
tionable  if  reputable  publications  like  The  Century  could  print 
anything  about  him  without  loss  of  their  dignity — or,  more  im 
portant,  their  subscribers.  But  meeting  Whistler  impressed  upon 
Mr.  Johnson,  as  it  was  impressed  upon  everyone  who  met  him, 
that  the  whimsicality  was  mythical.  Mr.  Johnson  was  struck 
with  him  and  with  all  he  said,  and  felt  that  the  right  impression 
had  not  been  given  of  his  personality.  We  agreed  to  do  the  work, 
and  to  make  notes  of  the  talk  and  we  did  begin  to  make  them, 
though  in  halting  fashion.  In  our  affection  for  Whistler  we  hardly 
liked  doing  it  without  his  knowing  it.  This  is  why  these  notes 
are  so  few. 
The  first  was  not  made  until  late  in  1898.  It  is  dated: 

September  25th,  1898.  A  visit  from  Whistler  early,  just  as  we  were 
settling  down  to  work.  He  is  depressed  ever  since  his  return  to 
town,  wonders  that  he  can  take  no  more  pleasure  in  work,  no  more 
interest  in  the  absurdities  of  the  art  critic,  he  will  not  even  be 
bothered  to  arrange  to  send  his  lithographs  to  the  coming  show 
at  South  Kensington.  But  he  at  least  is  gay  enough  to  report 
about  the  new  book  [The  Baronet  and  the  Butterfly]  and  to  tell  us 
two  stories.  The  book  is  stupendous —  "Well,  you  know  there 
was  the  toad  I  was  to  get  as  a  model  for  the  'toad  in  the  belly' 
to  decorate  the  Dedication.  I  was  to  apply  for  one  to  the  Zoological 
Gardens,  Wimbush  was  to  find  one,  but  in  the  meanwhile  Teddy 
Godwin  brought  one  and  made  a  drawing  of  it.  But  the  thing 
died.  You  know,  they  say  I  starved  it.  They  had  put  it  in  a 
paper  box.  Well,  it  must  have  caught  a  fly  or  two.  And  I  thought 
toads  lived  in  stone  or  amber  or  something  for  hundreds  of  years. 
Perhaps  it  was  because  I  hadn't  the  amber." 

One  of  his  stories  was  of  Lady  Donoughmore:  "Well,  she  was 
staying  with  Mrs.  Bradley  Martin  and  she  told  it  to  me  herself 
as  an  instance  of  American  bad  manners  rather  than  in  enjoyment 
1897-1898]  19 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

of  the  superb  humour  of  it.  Mrs.  Bradley  Martin,  having  come 
over  here  and  married  her  daughter  to  a  title  and  studied  the  Red 
Book,  had  rather  sized  things  up.  And  so,  when  Lady  Donough- 
more,  in  a  room  the  Duchess  of  something  occupied  the  week-end 
before,  found  her  mattress  shockingly  hard  and  complained  to  the 
maid  and  asked  for  another,  Mrs.  Bradley  Martin,  at  her  toilet 
when  the  maid  brought  the  message,  waved  her  aside  with  supreme 
indifference.  'What  has  done  for  a  Duchess  to  sleep  on,'  she  said, 
'is  good  enough  for  a  Countess  to  rough  it  on!'  "  This  recalled  to 
him  the  other  story  of  the  typical  "Aoh  ah"  Englishman  coming 
for  the  first  time  to  a  Pullman  car.  "Aoh!"  he  called  out,  "Aoh, 
I  say,  how  do  you  get  in  heah?"  Strowbridge,  the  Pullman  man 
ager  in  England,  was  passing.  "Well,"  he  said,  "the  common-sense 
man  walks  in  at  the  door,  but  for  the  God  damned  fool  we  keep  a 
ladder  and  he  crawls  in  through  the  roof.  John,  fetch  the  ladder." 

These  are  the  stories  that  Whistler  loved,  enjoying  them  in  a  way 
the  Briton  cannot  grasp.  The  country-house  week-end  parties 
were  an  inexhaustible  source  of  fun.  About  a  scandal  that  was 
making  much  talk  in  London,  his  comment  was,  "Well,  you  know, 
for  week-ends  the  rule  should  be  to  ring  a  loud  bell  at  five  in  the 
morning,  after  which  guests  are  expected  to  be  found  in  no  rooms 
save  their  own.  What?"  He  told  the  story  of  Lady  Donoughmore 
in  no  unkindness,  for  he  liked  her,  even  if  her  sense  of  humour 
sometimes  failed.  He  met  her  and  Lord  Donoughmore  often  at 
Heinemann's,  and  we  have  seen  the  letter  he  wrote  her  after  her 
husband's  death,  as  tender  a  letter  of  condolence  as  we  have  ever 
read.  "I  never  forget  your  own  sweet  sympathy  in  my  deep 
sorrow,"  he  told  her,  "and  Donoughmore's  kind  hand  upon  my 
shoulder  when  again  we  met." 

The  exhibition  at  South  Kensington  was  the  Centenary  Exhibition 
of  Lithography  organized  by  the  British  Government,  and  J.,  who 
was  on  the  Royal  Committee,  was  anxious  for  Whistler  to  make 
a  fine  showing. 

The  Baronet  and  the  Butterfly  was  dedicated  to  those  members  of 
the  New  English  Art  Club  who  were  too  afraid  to  lose  favour 
with  Sir  William  Eden,  the  rich  man  and  the  art  patron,  to  back 
Whistler  in  his  second  fight  for  art  for  the  artists'  sake.  He  did 
not  let  them  off  lightly.  For  months  they  dreaded  to  go  to  their 
usual  haunts,  where  Whistler  had  a  way  of  turning  up  unexpectedly 
20  [1897-1898 


FRUITIERE,  RUE  DE  CRENELLE 

LITHOGRAPH.  W.  7O 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


ST.  GILES-IN-THE-FIELDS 

LITHOGRAPH.  W.    I2p 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL 

and  taunting  them  with  the  toad  in  their  belly  and  the  throes  of 
indigestion  that  came  of  it.  Teddy  Godwin  who  found  the  model 
for  the  toad  was  his  step-son.  E.  J.  Sullivan,  talking  over  the 
affair  some  years  afterwards,  recalled  Whistler's  sending  a  wire 
to  the  Chelsea  Club  when  he  won  the  Eden  case,  asking  them  how 
they  liked  the  toad,  which  Sullivan  thought  rubbing  it  in,  con 
sidering  that  Whistler  used  to  come  down  there  often  and  empty 
the  place.  J.  remembers  Wilson  Steer  one  day  saying  what  was 
the  use  of  coming  to  the  Club  any  longer  to  get  kicked.  Sullivan 
also  recalled  an  occasion  when  MacColl  tackled  Whistler,  who 
was  in  his  best  form,  and  every  time  MacColl  would  try  and  get 
in  a  word,  Whistler  would  put  an  eyeglass  on  the  table  and  say 
"And" — and  this  would  come  out  with  such  mock  strenuousness 
that  MacColl  never  got  a  chance  to  say  anything,  and  Whistler 
had  it  all  his  own  way.  Nor  was  it  only  the  artists  who  feasted  on 
the  toad.  When  he  asked  us  to  collect  certain  facts  from  dealers 
as  evidence  in  the  Eden  Case,  he  warned  us  of  one  dealer  because 
"You  know — well — I  believe  the  Baronet  sends  him  game." 
One  evening  just  after  Whistler's  death,  Lavery  told  us  the  end 
of  Whistler's  membership  in  the  Chelsea  Arts  Club. 

July  ipth,  1903.  Lavery  said  that  a  couple  of  years  ago,  when 
the  Chelsea  Club  moved  into  their  new  house,  and  he  made  him 
self  largely  responsible  financially  for  it,  the  question  of  Whistler's 
membership  came  up.  Whistler  had  not  paid  his  subscription  for 
some  years,  but  at  the  Council  (or  Committee?)  meeting,  Lavery 
urged  that  such  a  distinguished  artist,  moreover  an  original  mem 
ber  of  the  Club,  without  whom,  indeed,  the  Chelsea  Club  would 
not  have  been,  should  be  made  an  Honorary  Member.  But  he 
was  told  it  would  be  the  ruin  of  the  Club;  Steer  and  others  would 
resign — they  did  not  want  him  about  the  Club.  After  the  meeting, 
Lavery  went  to  Steer  and  asked  him  point  blank,  if  it  was  so — 
Steer  blushed,  was  confused,  said  there  was  a  mistake.  However, 
Whistler  was  not  elected,  and  Lavery,  having  taken  over  so  much 
responsibility,  did  not  resign  at  once,  as  he  wanted  to.  The  men 
would  have  said  he  was  taking  advantage  of  the  dispute  over  the 
Honorary  Membership  to  shirk  it. 

It  is  hard  to  explain  why,  but  having  started  to  make  notes  of 
Whistler,  a  few  days  later  E.  was  making  one  of  a  visit  from  Fred 
erick  Sandys,  the  great  illustrator  of  the  Sixties,  friend  and  enemy 
1897-1898]  21 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

of  the  Pre-Raphaelites,  her  only  note  of  his  many  visits  to  us 
at  this  period.  We  would  give  much  now  had  we  written  at  the 
time  an  account  of  how  he  and  Whistler  met  one  afternoon  in 
Buckingham  Street  after  years  of  not  meeting  anywhere.  The 
trouble  between  them,  Sandys  said  afterwards  to  Mr.  Kyllman 
(of  Constable's),  was  that  he  remonstrated  with  Whistler  about 
The  Peacock  Room,  and  that  Whistler  resented  it,  which  is  more 
than  likely.  He  then  went  on  to  describe  their  meeting.  When, 
as  he  sat  with  us,  he  heard  the  knock,  "no  one  but  Whistler  would 
knock  like  that,"  he  said  to  himself,  and  he  grew  nervous — as  we 
well  remember.  But  Whistler,  he  added,  was  charming,  so  charm 
ing  that  that  same  year  he  invited  Sandys  to  dine  with  him,  "and 
we  will  get  Joe  Pennell,"  he  wrote.  We  give  E's.  note  as  it  is, 
for  he  told  us  many  things  we  had  never  heard  before  and  have 
never  heard  since,  and  they  concern  a  group  of  Whistler's  earliest 
friends  in  London.  We  must  not  be  held  responsible  for  Sandy's 
facts  or  criticisms.  For  all  his  dignity  of  demeanor  and  suave 
solemnity  of  speech,  he  was  suspected  of  being  a  bit  of  a  Mun- 
chausen.  That  was  why  he  was  amusing. 

October  $rd,  1898.  Sandys  came  in  early  in  the  afternoon,  a  little 
after  two.  J.  had  to  leave  almost  at  once  for  a  Committee  Meeting 
at  South  Kensington  for  the  Lithograph  Show.  But  Sandys 
stayed  on  until  half  past  six,  and  talked  steadily  the  whole  after 
noon.  It  was  like  listening  to,  instead  of  reading,  a  book  of 
memoirs.  He  told  one  story  after  another,  so  that  it  would  be 
hopeless  to  try  and  remember  them  all.  J's.  connection  with  the 
coming  Exhibition  of  Lithographs  at  South  Kensington  and  the 
fact  that  Sandys'  Nightmare  [the  parody  of  Millais'  Sir  Isumbras 
at  the  Ford]  is  to  be  shown  started  him  talking  about  it.  He  thought 
our  impression  was  one  of  ten  printed  on  India  paper,  but,  looking 
at  it  more  closely,  he  found  it  was  not.  He  hardly  knew  whether 
it  could  be  called  a  lithograph.  It  was  done  partly  with  a  brush, 
partly  with  a  pen,  on  zinc  with  some  sort  of  ink  brought  to  him 
by  a  man  who  patented  the  method.  It  was  out  five  days  after 
the  Academy  opened  [the  Royal  Academy  of  1857  in  which  Millais 
showed  his  Sir  Isumbras}  and  three  hundred  were  sold  the  first 
week  and  then  the  man  disappeared  with  the  plate  and  has  never 
been  heard  of  since.  Naturally,  Sandys  had  not  much  time.  The 

22  [1897-1898 


THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL 

only  way  he  got  a  glimpse  of  Rossetti,  whom  he  did  not  then  know, 
was  by  asking  for  an  introduction  from  a  friend  and  going  with  it 
to  Chatham  Place  to  see  Rossetti's  pictures.  Rossetti  came  to 
the  door,  said  he  was  sorry  but  he  was  busy  with  a  man  who  was 
buying  things — would  Sandys  come  again? — and  Sandys,  from 
that  one  glimpse,  made  the  portrait.  The  drawing  won  him 
Ross'etti's  friendship.  Millais  did  not  mind  it.  Holman  Hunt 
was  indignant.  But  the  furious  person  was  Ruskin's  father  who 
wanted  to  prosecute  him.  However,  the  print  had  been  published 
anonymously  and  for  a  long  while  no  one  knew  who  did  it.  Old 
Ruskin,  breakfasting  with  Smith,  the  publisher,  offered  him  five 
hundred  pounds  if  he  would  find  out  the  author  of  the  caricature. 
Millais,  he  describes  as  beautiful  as  a  god  in  his  youth.  Sandys 
had  won  a  Silver  Medal  at  the  Society  of  Arts  for  water-colours 
of  birds,  and  then  had  to  come  up  to  London  and,  at  their  place 
in  John  Street,  make  drawings  of  the  same  kind  to  prove  they 
were  his  work.  He  was  left  in  a  room  with  Millais,  who  had  won 
a  Gold  Medal  and  was  also  being  put  to  the  test.  People  who  came 
in  looked  at  Millais'  painting  and  went  away  whispering  "astound 
ing  genius',"  but  never  looked  at  Sandys  who  was  copying  a  pigeon 
brought  from  a  near  market.  Sandys  was  awfully  nervous. 
Millais  was  full  of  confidence  in  himself — not  conceit,  but  certainty 
of  what  he  could  do.  He  encouraged  Sandys — "that's  all  right," 
he  said  of  the  drawing  of  the  feathers,  "it's  the  feet  you  have  to 
look  out  for,"  which  Sandys  thought  showed  wonderful  insight 
for  a  youth  of  Millais'  age — the  feet  being  the  difficult  thing. 
Later  on,  he  tried  to  reunite  Millais  and  Rossetti,  who  did  not 
see  each  other  because  Rossetti  was  hurt  at  Millais'  not  having 
suggested  his  name  for  the  Royal  Academy  when  there  was  the 
chance.  Sandys  asked  Rossetti  to  dinner,  saying  Millais  was  to 
be  there,  and  Rossetti  would  not  come.  Then  Sandys  asked  him 
without  telling  him,  and  Rossetti  came,  and  the  two  were  friends 
again  at  once.  Millais  begged  to  be  asked  to  the  studio  to  see 
Rossetti's  pictures  and  asked  Rossetti  to  come  and  see  his  children 
— he  had  some  very  pretty  children,  he  said.  But  Rossetti  never 
went  and  never  asked  Millais  to  come  to  him  and  so  they  lost 
1897-1898!  23 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

sight  of  each  other  again — Rossetti  was  cruelly  misrepresented  by 
William  Michael  Rossetti,  Sandys  thought,  for  he  was  really  the 
most  abstemious  of  men — knew  so  little  of  wine  that,  having  tasted 
a  "bishop"  of  ordinary  claret  warmed  with  spices,  wanted  to  make 
one  of  fine  old  Madeira  worth  about  two  or  three  pounds  a  bottle 
that  some  one  had  given  him.  Sandys  was  shocked  and  would 
not  allow  it. 

Sandys  went  once  with  Rossetti,  Swinburne  and  George  Meredith 
to  Hampton  Court,  and  between  Waterloo  and  Hampton  Court 
Station  each  one  of  the  three  wrote  a  poem.  He  remembered 
Swinburne's  in  particular  because  it  was  Faustine  written  to  see 
how  many  rhymes  he  could  find  to  the  name.  He  also  was  with 
Swinburne  and  Meredith  when  they  had  their  final  quarrel. 
They  had  just  been  reconciled  after  another  quarrel  and  were 
dining  amiably  at  the  Garrick  Club.  It  was  when  Meredith  was 
editing  The  Fortnightly  Review  for  John  Morley,  then  in  America. 
Meredith  had  recently  sent  Swinburne  ten  pounds  for  a  poem. 
After  dinner,  Swinburne  asked  Meredith  why  he  sent  ten  pounds? 
Meredith  explained  he  was  paying  all  contributors  during  Morley's 
absence.  "Yes,"  said  Swinburne,  "but  why  ten?"  Meredith 
explained  it  was  what  he  usually  got  for  his  own  poems.  "Yes, 
for  yours,"  said  Swinburne,  "but  for  mine?"  Meredith  tried  to 
point  out  the  justice  of  it:  what  was  enough  for  him  was  enough 
for  Swinburne.  Swinburne  got  up,  came  over  to  him,  and  slapped 
his  face.  That  was  the  end  of  their  friendship.  Sandys  defended 
Swinburne  and  said  he  was  not  half  so  drunken  as  his  reputation. 
His  strong  intellect  kept  him  from  showing,  or  perhaps  feeling, 
the  effect  of  drink  as  others  did.  As  an  example — one  evening, 
while  living  with  Rossetti,  he  was  very  drunk,  at  the  stage  when 
he  saw  two  candles  where  there  was  really  but  one.  After  dinner 
William  Michael  Rossetti  came  in  with  Walt  Whitman's  Leaves 
of  Grass,  the  first  copy  brought  to  England.  Swinburne  was  eager 
to  read  it,  but  when  he  opened  the  volume  he  saw  two  Leaves  of 
Grass.  He  just  clapped  a  hand  over  one  eye,  and  with  the  other 
eye  saw  distinctly  and  then  read  easily. 

Loud  in  praise  of  Meredith  as  a  brilliant  talker.  He  was  wonderful, 
24  [1897-1898 


SWINBURNE 

DRY-POINT.  M.    136 


PORTRAIT  ATTRIBUTED  TO 
WHISTLER 


PORTRAIT  BY   FANTIN   LATOUR 

OIL 

Head  cut  from  the  large  painting,  The  Toast, 
destroyed 


Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 


THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL 

though  at  the  expense  of  his  friends.  Often  had  three  or  four 
friends  dining  with  him  on  Sunday  and,  if  the  humour  seized  him, 
would  select  one  of  the  company  and  dissect  him  for  the  benefit  of 
the  others.  It  was  like  taking  a  butterfly,  pinning  it,  still  alive, 
to  the  wall  and  examining  every  quivering  detail.  This  lost  him 
many  friends,  was  the  reason  for  his  quarrel  with  Rossetti.  He 
was  living  in  the  Chelsea  house.  Some  of  Rossetti's  patrons  had 
come  to  dinner  and  Meredith  chose  this  occasion  to  make  sport  of 
Rossetti.  The  result  was  Rossetti  turned  him  out. 
The  first  quarrel  with  Swinburne  was  because  Meredith  put  him 
unmistakably,  as  a  red-haired  poet,  into  one  of  his  novels.  Swinburne 
did  not  appreciate  it.  The  novel  was  Emilia  in  England,  or  something 
of  the  sort,  and  now  has  another  name  [Sandra  Belloni\.  Meredith 
was  always  going  through  different  philosophical  or  social  or  religious 
phases.  One  day  he  announced  he  was  a  socialist.  Sandys  asked 
him  if  he  followed  Morris  or  Crane?  Neither,  Meredith  said.  All 
men  who  thought  must,  at  one  time  or  another,  pass  through  a  stage 
of  socialism;  of  course,  it  was  impossible  to  say  how  long  he  would 
remain  a  socialist.  He  had  been,  he  added,  everything  in  his  time 
save,  lowering  his  voice,  a  curate.  Lowell,  after  lunching  with 
Meredith  at  the  house  of  Mrs.  Lawrence,  where  Meredith  as  usual 
talked  in  a  loud,  vibrant  voice,  said  he  had  been  thinking  all  through 
lunch  of  the  Bible.  "But  why?"  asked  Sandys.  "Because,"  Lowell 
explained,  "in  the  Bible  we  read  of  the  still,  small  voice  of  God." 
Sandys  once  took  two  Americans  down  to  see  Meredith.  They 
arrived  in  the  morning,  Meredith  met  them,  and  from  the  moment 
they  were  on  the  platform  until  he  drove  them  back  at  ten  o'clock 
at  night,  he  never  once  stopped  talking. 

Ruskin,  Sandys  said,  treated  Lady  Millais  when  she  was  Mrs.  Ruskin 
abominably.  He  was  not  brutal,  he  never  reproved  her.  But  he 
kept  a  diary,  and  every  Monday  morning  he  had  her  up  before  him 
and  read  her  a  list  of  all  her  misdemeanors  for  every  day  in  the 
past  week. 

Sandys'  caricature  of  Millais'  picture  is  now  well  known.  It  was 
forgotten  for  a  while — as,  indeed,  was  Sandys — but  when,  in  the 
1897-1898]  25 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Nineties,  interestwas  revived  by  J.  in  the  work  of  the  Sixties,  which 
he  called  "The  Golden  Age  of  Illustration,"  the  title  soon  borrowed 
by  Gleeson  White  and  others  both  here  and  abroad  for  their  own 
use,  the  print  re-appeared  and  was  reproduced  in  many  articles. 
For  long  it  hung  on  our  Buckingham  Street  walls.  The  Ruskin 
family  objected  to  it  because  Ruskin  was  drawn  as  an  ass  with  /.  R. 
Oxon  branded  on  his  rump.  He  carried  a  great  big  Millais  in  armour 
on  his  back,  a  little  Rossetti  in  his  arms,  a  smaller  Holman  Hunt 
hanging  on  behind,  and  a  still  smaller  Titian  and  Michael  Angelo 
chanting  Or  a  pro  nobis  on  the  further  shore. 

Holman  Hunt,  of  whom  at  one  time  we  saw  a  good  deal,  as  we  met 
all  the  Pre-Raphaelites  except  Rossetti,  was  most  interesting  when 
you  got  him  away  from  his  work  to  talk  about  himself.  When  he 
talked  about  anybody  else  or  about  his  paintings,  he  was  an  awful 
old  bore.  J.  remembers  going  down  to  the  studio,  in  Fulham  to  see 
The  Shadow  of  the  Cross  being  fixed  up,  and  Holman  Hunt's  saying 
that  it  took  him  three  weeks  or  three  days  to  paint  one  of  the  shavings 
on  the  floor.  "H'm,"  Whistler  laughed  when  J.  told  him  later,  "  some 
people  could  have  done  it  better  in  three  minutes,  and  then  wouldn't 
have  said  anything  about  it!" 

Except  in  Sandys'  story,  we  know  of  no  medal  won  by  Millais  at  the 
Society  of  Arts  except  a  Silver  Medal  awarded  him  when  he  was 
nine  years  old.  No  wonder  Sandys  was  struck  by  the  insight  of  so 
youthful  a  critic.  In  the  Life  of  Millais  by  his  son,  the  reason  for 
his  quarrel  with  Rossetti  is  not  given.  Only  the  discreet  fact  is  stated 
that  after  1852  Millais  seldom  saw  Rossetti. 

If  we  are  not  mistaken,  Swinburne's  account  of  how  Faustine  came  to 
be  written  is  rather  different  from  Sandys'.  And  we  can  hardly 
believe  that  Swinburne  could  have  been  much  annoyed  by  "Tracy 
Runningbrook,"  the  poet  in  Sandra  Belloni.  The  parody  upon  his 
name  is  not  offensive  as  Dr.  Furnival's  "Pigsbrook"  was,  and  the 
poet,  with  hair  red  as  a  blown  flame  and  a  way  of  coining  words,  is 
as  unobjectionable  as^his  name.  But  Meredith's  letters  show  there 
was  friction  between  Swinburne  and  himself  over  The  Fortnightly 
rate  of  payment  during  Meredith's  editorship,  and  certainly  the  two 
men  did  not  see  each  other  for  years.  Sandys'  story,  so  far  as  this 
goes,  may  be  true. 

His  version  of  Meredith's  quarrel  with  Rossetti  is  virtually  the  same 
we  had  from  Whistler,  according  to  whom  it  occurred  the  evening 
Swinburne  was  reading  Leaves  of  Grass  and  the  wombat  was  devour 
ing  Rossetti's  cigars — altogether  an  eventful  evening.  Whistler 
gave  Mrs.  Clifford  Addams  other  details  which  we  do  not  remember 
hearing  from  him.  There  had  been  a  disagreement  between  Meredith 
26  [1897-1898 


THE  FIRST  IDEA  OF  THE  JOURNAL 

and  Rossetti,  and  Meredith  had  gossipped  about  it  to  a  cabman  at 
the  corner,  and  this  came  to  Rossetti  who  was  furious.  They  were 
all  dining  together  that  evening,  Whistler  and  Howell  too.  The  meat 
was  served  and  Rossetti  began — he  was  the  more  indignant  because, 
so  Whistler  told  Mrs.  Addams,  the  others  had  no  money  at  the  time 
and  were  living  there  practically  as  his  guests.  He  declared  that 
people  who  could  talk  that  way  to  cabmen  were  no  gentlemen,  and 
in  his  rage  he  brought  down  his  spoon  hard  into  the  dish,  and  the 
gravy  squirted  right  into  Whistler's  eye.  And  Meredith  got  up  and 
left  the  house  and  the  table  and  never  came  back.  But  it  made  no 
difference  in  his  friendliness  to  Whistler.  Almost  half  a  century 
later,  after  reading  our  Life,  he  wrote  to  Heinemann,  "  It  shows  him 
as  I  knew  him,  a  perfectly  genial  soul." 

It  is  a  pity  that  Edmund  Gosse,  William  Michael  Rossetti  and  Wil 
liam  Meredith  never  consulted  Sandys,  a  greater  pity  that  E.  did 
not  make  more  notes  of  his  talk.  It  was  this  sort  of  thing  we  used 
to  listen  to  daily  and  rarely  put  down.  Those  who  pretended  to 
write  about  the  Pre-Raphaelites  may  have  heard  it,  but  they  never 
dared  to  print  it.  These  big  men,  as  we  saw  them  or  heard  of  them, 
were  perfectly  human.  Their  biographers  have  mostly  made  them 
into  pompous  prigs.  Mr.  Luke  lonides  could  tell,  and  did  tell  us 
in  1906  and  1907,  almost  as  many  stories  as  Sandys,  for  the  house 
of  his  father,  Constantine  lonides,  was  a  meeting  place  for  them 
all.  One  of  his  stories  was  of  Burne-Jones  and  himself  going  to  a 
country  fair  and  wandering  into  a  side  show  to  see  a  tattooed  lady, 

September  2?th,  1906 — with  he  was  afraid  to  say  how  many  sub 
jects  tattooed  on  her — on  one  knee  the  American  Eagle,  on  the  other 
the  Union  Jack,  to  symbolize  the  understanding  there  should  be  among 
nations,  and  on  her  back,  Leonardo's  Last  Supper.  And  she  really 
was  amazing  and  they  enjoyed  it  hugely.  Some  four  or  five  years 
afterwards,  in  London,  Burne-Jones  burst  in  upon  lonides  and  told 
him  the  same  tattooed  lady  was  at  the  Aquarium  and  they  must 
go  and  see  her  again.  And  they  went,  and  she  had  grown  very  stout 
in  the  meanwhile  and  when  they  looked  at  the  Last  Supper,  all  the 
apostles  wore  a  broad  grin.  Another  story  was  of  Rossetti  and 
William  Morris.  Rossetti  was  never  in  sympathy  with  Morris'  Norse 
studies  and  sagas,  and  once  when  Morris  was  reciting  the  adventures 
of  one  of  his  Norse  heroes,  Rossetti  interrupted  to  say  he  didn't 
think  much  of  a  man  who  had  a  dragon  or  a  serpent  for  a  brother. 
"I  had  a  great  deal  rather  have  a  dragon  for  a  brother,"  Morris 
1897-1898]  27 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

roared,  "than  a  damned  fool!"  A  third  story  was  of  Swinburne 
at  his  Club  on  one  of  those  evenings  of  which  his  biographers  prefer 
not  to  write.  As  he  stumbled  out  he  lifted  up  his  cane  and 
knocked  down  all  the  hats  hanging  up  in  the  hall — or,  in  a  variation 
of  the  tale,  tried  on  each  hat  in  turn  and  when  it  did  not  fit,  threw 
it  on  the  floor  and  jumped  on  it.  The  Club  expelled  him  and  many 
felt  it  an  outrage  that  the  author  of  Laus  Feneris  and  Atalanta  should 
be  so  treated.  Whistler,  and  several  members  with  him,  resigned. 
Other  authorities  say  that  Whistler  did  not  resign  but  allowed  his 
membership  to  lapse,  forgot  all  about  it,  came  back  the  next  evening, 
ordered  something  to  drink,  and  paid  for  it.  The  following  morning 
the  Secretary  returned  the  money,  regretting  that  no  one  not  a 
member  could  order  and  pay  for  anything.  Excellence  in  billiards 
rather  than  distinction  in  art  was  then  the  chief  qualification  for 
membership  in  the  art  clubs  of  London. 

A  characteristic  story  of  Sandys  himself,  we  had  from  Mr.  Hartrick: — 
July  2Oth,  1903.  Whistler  at  Sandys'  studio  met  Sandys'  father — 
curled,  white-waistcoated,  and  wonderful  in  every  way.  Sandys  asked 
the  old  gentleman,  "Will  you  have  a  glass  of  port,  father?"  "Well, 
Fred,  I  don't  mind  if  I  do!"  and  Sandys  searched  elaborately  in  a  cup 
board, /'Strange,  there  does  not  seem  to  be  any  port,  will  you  have 
some  brandy,  father?"  "Well,  Fred,  I  don't  mind  if  I  do!"  Another 
search,  "Strange,  I  can't  find  the  brandy.  Will  gin  do  father?" 
"Why,  yes,  Fred."  And  Sandys  called  the  slavey.  "Run  and  get  a 
pen'orth  of  gin."  Then  the  father,  as  elaborately,  got  out  a  cigar 
case  with  two  cigars  in  it,  offered  it  to  Whistler  who  refused,  then 
to  Sandys  who  took  one.  The  old  gentleman  put  the  other  back  in 
his  pocket  elaborately,  got  out  his  knife  and  handed  it  to  Sandys, 
"Do  you  know  which  end  to  cut  off,  Fred?" 

We  insert  here  a  much  later  note  by  E.,  because  it  relates  to  one  of 
this  group  of  artists,  giving  a  pleasant  glimpse  of  the  friendly  side 
of  Millais. 

January  2ist,  1905.  Lunching  with  Mrs.  John  Lane.  I  sat  next  to 
Miss  Millais,  who  said  she  had  one  or  two  letters  Whistler  wrote  to 
28  [1897-1898 


WHISTLER  IN  THE   BIG  HAT 

ETCHING.   M.  54 

Whistler's  Hat,  worn  in  Paris  and  on  journey  to 
Alsace 


PROOF  OF  DESTROYED  PLATE 


Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


(See  page  40) 


WHISTLER  SMOKING 

OIL 

Attributed  to  Whistler.     By  permission  of 
A.  E.  Gallatin,  Esq. 


WHISTLER  IN  THE  BIG  HAT 

OIL 
Freer    Collection    National    Museum,    Washington 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

her  aunt  which  she  would  let  us  see.  She  was  not  sure  if  those  to 
her  father  were  preserved,  but  she  would  find  out.  Her  father  had 
been  fond  of  Whistler  whom  he  was  often  able  to  help  when  Whistler 
got  into  trouble  from  lending  money  to  his  friends,  or  from  other 
things.  She  went  with  him  once  to  call  on  Whistler  in  the  White 
House.  It  was  a  moment  of  difficulties,  and  when  they  rang  the 
door  was  on  the  chain  and  cautiously  opened.  No  one  could  come  in, 
they  were  told.  But  Millais  said  he  was  a  friend  of  Whistler's — it 
made  no  difference — the  door  was  closed.  However,  they  walked 
up  and  down  the  street  in  front  of  the  house  and,  after  a  while,  they 
saw  Whistler  peeping  out  of  a  window.  Then  they  were  let  in.  They 
saw  nothing  of  Whistler  after  he  was  married.  Somehow,  her  mother 
never  called  on  Mrs.  Whistler  and  so  they  never  met.  But  Whistler 
came  to  inquire  after  her  father  during  his  illness. 

There  are  only  two  more  Whistler  notes  in  1898.  The  first  is  dated: 
Tuesday,  October  nth,  1898.  Mr.  Armstrong  of  Bristol  was  to  dine 
with  us.  A  few  minutes  to  seven  Payne  arrives  from  Whitehall 
Court,  saying  Mr.  Whistler  wants  to  know,  are  we  at  home?  and  may 
he  come  and  dine?  I  send  word,  yes,  we  shall  be  delighted — but — 
we  are  expecting  a  friend,  we  have  said  seven  is  the  hour,  and  dinner 
will  be  ready  then,  and  I  do  not  want  to  keep  it  waiting,  though  we 
may  be  a  little  late  as  J.  has  been  detained.  At  half  past  seven,  a 
note  saying  letters  to  Paris  will  keep  him,  cannot  possibly  get  here 
till  eight,  and  so  will  not  come  to  dinner,  but  will  look  in  later.  I 
write  that  we  are  only  just  sitting  down,  won't  he  come?  As  we  are 
eating  our  fish,  messenger  returns  to  say  he  will  be  with  us  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour.  He  comes  with  the  coffee,  eats  his  warmed-up- 
dinner  without  a  murmur,  finds  out  that  Mr.  Armstrong  belongs  to 
the  British  Artists — he  is  enchanted — it  was  most  delightful  for  him, 
he  tells  us  afterwards,  but  not  sure  how  Mr.  Armstrong  felt,  sitting 
face  to  face  with  him. 

He  tells  us  how  he  happened  to  join  the  Society  .  .  .  Mr.  Armstrong 
told  the  story  of  the  Carlyle  portrait,  which  Whistler  said  was  founded 
more  or  less  on  fact.  ...  He  talked  to  us  again  about  the  American- 
Spanish  war.  .  .  . 
1897-1898]  29 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Whistler  was  staying  that  autumn  with  Heinemann  at  Whitehall 
Court  only  a  few  minutes  from  Buckingham  Street,  and  when  he  was 
there  Payne,  Heinemann's  valet,  often  appeared  with  just  such  a 
message.  It  must  be  said  for  Whistler  that  if  he  was  late  to  dinner, 
and  our  hour  of  seven  was  distasteful  to  him,  he  gave  no  trouble 
when  he  came.  He  was  fastidious  about  his  dinner,  but  when  he 
knew  the  fault  was  his,  he  ate  his  warmed-up  dishes  as  if  he  liked 
them.  His  friends — friends  to  whom  he  went  intimately  and  infor 
mally — understood  this.  Mrs.  Alan  S.  Cole  has  often  laughed  with 
us  over  the  way  she  managed  to  please  him.  Her  cook  got  to 
know  that  if  he  had  sardines  and  an  egg  done  in  a  little  casserole 
and,  above  all,  plenty  of  bread  and  butter  directly  in  front  of  him,  he 
was  content.  The  details  of  the  talk  which  make  this  an  unusually 
long  note  we  have  not  given  because  we  used  them  in  the  Life.  The 
British  Artists,  Carlyle,  the  Spanish-American  War,  were  subjects  he 
never  tired  of. 

Thursday,  October  i^th,  1898.  Edgar  Wilson  and  Fernald—  The  Cat 
and  the  Cherub — were  dining  with  us.  Whistler  had  said  vaguely  he 
might  come.  I  had  a  place  put  for  him,  but  I  expected  him  so  little 
that  I  did  not  wait  a  minute  after  dinner  was  ready.  At  twenty 
minutes  past  eight,  in  he  walked,  just  as  we  were  finishing,  smiling, 
imperturbable,  eating  as  leisurely  as  if  five  people  were  not  waiting 
for  him.  Again  he  told  us  of  the  magnificence  of  the  war,  and  the 
chivalry.  And  to  Edgar  Wilson,  whom  he  had  never  met  before, 
he  was  as  kind  as  it  seems  to  me  he  is  above  all  to  young  artists 
starting  out  in  life.  The  talk  of  the  evening  was  chiefly  upon  the 
fact  that  there  can  be  no  progress  in  art  though  there  may  be  in 
the  knowledge  of  art.  It  was  the  old  discussion  of  many  evenings, 
especially  the  evening  Iwan  Muller  and  Van  Dyke  were  dining 
with  us:  "Art,"  Whistler  declared,  "is  as  exact  as  science." 

The  evening  referred  to  was  in  the  earlier  noteless  day^.  Van  Dyke 
is  Mr.  John  C.  Van  Dyke,  whom  Whistler  was  always  glad  to 
meet,  and  Iwan  Muller  was  a  journalist,  assistant  editor  of  The 
Pall  Mall  Gazette  in  the  first  years  of  Astor's  proprietorship,  after 
wards  leading  writer  on  The  Daily  Telegraph,  and  approved  of  by 
Whistler  because  of  his  Russian  father,  though  in  everything  but 
looks  he  was  as  English  as  if  he  were  trying  to  live  down  his 
Russian  ancestry.  Mr.  Van  Dyke  has  recorded  in  a  chapter  on 
30  [1897-1898 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

Whistler,  in  American  Painting  and  Its  Tradition,  one  event  of 
the  evening,  but  not  its  most  memorable:  Iwan  Muller's  descrip 
tion  of  the  brilliancy  of  Northern  colour,  his  own  desire  to  listen, 
and  Whistler's  hopeless  boredom  with  it,  only  waking  up  when  the 
subject  was  changed  to  art  as  a  science,  which  engrossed  him  more 
and  more  as  time  went  on  and  often  kept  us  hours  round  the  table 
in  the  Buckingham  Street  dining-room. 

Mr.  Fernald,  dining  with  us  about  a  fortnight  after  Whistler's 
death,  spoke  to  us  of  his  meeting  with  Whistler  on  this  occasion. 
He  said  as  many  have  said,  that  he  owed  his  one  glimpse  of  Whistler 
to  us,  and  a  wonderful  glimpse  it  was.  For  Whistler  talked  of 
art.  Art  was  always  the  same;  there  could  be  no  change;  art  was 
eternal;  a  theory  he  only  half  understood  until  now  that  he  was 
reading  the  Ten  O'Clock.  And  again  four  years  later,  again  dining 
with  us,  he  recalled  the  day  he  met  Whistler  in  our  flat  as  one  of 
the  days  that  stand  out  in  his  life.  He  spoke  to  Whistler  of  Japan 
ese  art  and  its  influence  on  Western  art,  and  Whistler  explained 
that  this  influence  meant  the  carrying  on  of  tradition,  not  a  revolu 
tion  in  Western  art,  for  art  is  unchangeable.  Whistler  was  the 
first  to  admit  its  influence  upon  his  work.  Not  that  his  work  had 
been  changed  by  it;  always,  he  insisted,  his  work  was  the  same,  in 
the  beginning  as  in  the  end. 


CHAPTER  IV:  THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL.  THE  YEARS 
EIGHTEEN  NINETY-NINE  TO  NINETEEN  HUNDRED 

Friday,  July  ifth,  1899.  About  half  an  hour  before  dinner,  to 
which  we  had  asked  Kennedy  and  young  Irving  Clark,  Kennedy 
arrived  to  say  that  Whistler  was  in  town  and  would  we  dine  with 
him  instead?  It  was  too  late — we  suggested  their  both  coming 
here  to  dinner  or  coming  in  afterwards.  But  they  put  in 
no  appearance. 

MR.  E.  G.  KENNEDY,  when  in  London  stayed  at  Garlant's  where 
Whistler  stayed,  and  was  much  with  him  as  will  be  seen.  O'K., 
Whistler  mostly  called  him,  we  never  knew  why  until  Mr.  Kennedy 
explained  a  few  months  ago.  He  had  been  talking  of  his  name 
and  its  variations  to  Mrs.  Whistler,  and  of  the  O'Kennedys  who 
had  vanished  because  they  didn't  owe  anyone  anything  any  more. 
But  Mrs.  Whistler  said  if  that  was  true  he  was  an  O'Kennedy,  he 
always  owed  them  something,  and  "O'K.  it  shall  be  from  now  on." 
1899-1900]  31 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

And  so,  it  became  his  familiar  name,  not  only  for  Mrs.  Whistler, 
but  for  us  all,  and  as  O'K.  he  will  often  appear  in  these  pages. 
Irving  Clark  is  our  cousin  who  was  in  London  on  his  way  home 
from  exciting  adventures  in  the  Balkans. 

Saturday,  July  i$th.  Whistler  arrived  early,  just  after  J.  had 
gone  out:  gay,  alert,  in  an  irreproachable  new  suit,  with  a  "dandy" 
straw  hat.  He  was  astonished  to  find  himself  here.  How,  indeed, 
was  it  possible  to  consider  a  relative  when  there  was  question  of 
going  to  him? 

His  talk  was  chiefly  of  the  school.  "It  is  amazing.  It  grows  more 
amazing  with  every  day.  No  one  knows  what  is  being  done  there. 
Really,  I  am  amazed  myself  when  I  see  it  all.  And,  you  know, 
this  is  the  proper  moment  to  make  the  world  see  what  is  going  on, 
and  you  surely  are  the  person  to  do  it.  I  have  been  thinking  it 
over.  I  would  not  care  to  have  it  come  from  me — it  would  not 
answer.  But  it  has  occurred  to  me  that  Miss  Bate  is  just  now  in 
London  on  her  way  from  Paris,  why  should  there  not  be  a  talk 
with  Miss  Bate?  What  more  appropriate?  Miss  Bate,  the  Massi- 
bre,  whose  painting  has  already  astonished  the  world  at  the  Inter 
national?"  I  told  him  I  knew  nothing  of  interviewing.  But  he 
thought  "Something  charming  can  be  done,  without  its  being 
necessarily  in  the  form  of  an  interview." — 

About  four  o'clock  he  reappeared,  beaming.  He  was  on  the  way 
to  the  station,  to  go  to  the  Heinemann's  at  Weybridge,  but  he  had 
stopped  to  tell  us.  "Really,  it  has  been  beautiful.  I  know  you 
will  enjoy  it — it  occurred  to  me  in  the  morning — the  Baronet's 
sale  to-day.  .  . 

The  Baronet  was  Sir  William  Eden.  The  story  of  the  sale,  as 
Whistler  gave  it,  is  in  the  Life. 

Though  E.  told  Whistler  that  she  knew  nothing  of  interviewing, 
she  did  eventually  write  something  about  the  Academic  Carmen. 
But  she  put  it  off  too  long  and  the  article  never  appeared.  When 
she  was  in  Paris,  Whistler  arranged  for  her  to  visit  the  school,  and 
she  has  memories  of  its  seclusion  in  the  Passage  Stanislas  and  of 
its  calm.  She  had  never  seen  anything  like  the  absorption  in  their 
work  of  the  women  in  the  life  class,  and  the  model,  posing  for  the 
32  [1899-1900 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

nude  on  the  throne  against  quiet  grey  draperies,  was  exactly  like 
a  Whistler,  needing  but  a  frame  to  complete  the  illusion.  It  helped 
her  to  understand  better  Whistler's  Propositions  which,  in  Duret's 
translation,  hung  upon  the  wall.  Miss  Inez  Bate,  now  Mrs.  Clifford 
Addams,  wrote,  at  Whistler's  request,  the  record  of  his  school  and 
his  methods  and  allowed  us  to  print  it  in  the  Life.  The  world 
would  be  the  richer  if  the  students  of  other  great  masters  had 
written  so  authentic  a  report  of  their  schools  and  systems.  Hers 
is  more  valuable  than  any  interview  by  E.  could  have  been.  But 
after  it  was  published  it  was  criticised  by  some  of  Mrs.  Addams' 
fellow  students — by  the  few  who  remained  faithful  for,  as  always, 
there  were  exceptions.  Mrs.  Graham  Shaw,  Miss  Halliday,  and 
one  or  two  others  objected  that  Mrs.  Addams  was  too  sweeping 
in  her  version  of  the  closing  of  the  school  and  the  dwindling  of  the 
students.  They  were  loyal  and  thought  their  loyalty  too  should 
have  recognition.  Out  of  the  school  came  two  or  three  who  dis 
tinguished  themselves,  a  good  record  for  any  art  school  that  runs 
so  short  a  time;  the  average  art  student  goes  to  a  master  only  to 
acquire  his  knowledge  of  a  lifetime  in  ten  minutes.  Therefore  it 
cannot  be  said  that  the  Academic  Carmen  was  altogether  a  failure. 
But  the  exceptions  were  few,  the  majority  of  students  were  dis 
appointed  for  the  reason  that  they  ought  never  to  have  been 
students.  As  Miss  Dixon  who  was  there  said,  it  was  astonishing 
how  many  women  came  at  first  simply  because  they  had  heard  so 
much  about  Whistler  and  wanted  to  see  him.  An  English  woman, 
who  crossed  the  Channel  purposely  to  have  a  look  at  him,  lived 
in  the  Champs-Elysees,  drove  to  the  studio  in  her  carriage,  and 
stayed  for  three  weeks  though  she  had  paid  for  three  months. 
Women  journalists  hoped  to  make  good  copy  out  of  the  classes. 
It  was  a  distress  to  Whistler  to  have  to  consider  the  work  of  such 
people,  and  they  were  gradually  weeded  out.  His  health  interfered 
with  his  attendance.  And  in  the  end  only  the  loyal  stayed  on 
until  they  were  dismissed.  The  notes  for  the  spring  of  1899  reveal 
the  activity  of  his  interest  in  the  school  and  his  high  ambitions 
for  it  as  long  as  he  was  well. 

Sunday,  July  i6th.  Whistler  came  to  supper.  Harry  Wilson  and 
Irving  Clark  here  and  later  Kennedy.  Whistler  at  first  inclined 
to  be  quiet  and  grumpy.  He  had  gone  toHeinemann's.  "Someone 
said,  'Have  a  hot  bath  before  dinner.'  The  very  thing,  I  thought, 
and  then,  after  dinner,  we  sat  out  on  the  lawn,  and  I  have  come 
back  to  town  with  a  cold,  and  now  I  am  going  to  be  ill."  But  he 
1899-1900]  33 

3 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

forgot  his  cold  when  he  found  that  Wilson  the  night  before  had  dined 
with  Mr.  Sydney  Morse,  and  that  Mr.  Morse  was  the  unknown  or 
unremembered  friend  upon  whose  arm  yesterday  he  entered  Chris 
tie's  in  triumph.  He  told  the  story  of  the  Eden  sale  again.  .  . 
He  said  he  met  Sargent  at  the  station,  going  to  Weybridge,  Sargent 
on  his  way  to  Sir  George  Lewis'.  They  had  a  compartment  to 
themselves,  to  Sargent's  intense  discomfiture.  "I  told  him  the 
whole  story,  you  know,  interspersing  it  with  'of  course,  you  under 
stand!'  and  'of  course,  you  sympathize!'  and  Sargent  looked 
hopelessly  at  door  and  window.  Not  that  Sargent  is  not  charming 
and  all  that — only,  a  sepulchre  of  dulness  and  propriety."  Later, 
some  one  was  talking  of  Rossetti.  "Rossetti,"  he  said,  "well,  you 
know,  not  a  painter,  but  a  gentleman  and  a  poet.  As  for  the 
others  dangling  after  him,  with  them  it  was  all  incapacity  and 
crime."  After  supper  Wilson  and  J.  sat  with  him  on  one  side  of 
the  room  and  held  a  sort  of  impromptu  Committee  Meeting  on 
International  affairs. 

Harry  Wilson  is  the  distinguished  English  artist — architect, 
painter,  jeweler,  sculptor,  manager,  author — a  man  of  many 
sides — now  President  of  the  Arts  and  Crafts  Exhibition  Society. 
Sydney  Morse  is  his  brother-in-law,  a  well-known  solicitor,  who 
in  the  old  days  rented  No.  2  Lindsey  Row  when  Whistler  moved 
out  of  it  into  the  White  House.  The  coincidence  of  meeting  Wilson 
the  day  after  the  Eden  sale  and  getting  from  him  the  effect  of  his 
presence  there  was  precisely  one  of  the  little  things  that,  as  he 
said,  Providence  sometimes  sent  him,  and  the  imprudent  bath  at 
Heinemann's  was  forgotten  and  the  illness  cured  before  it  came. 
Morse  is  also  the  owner  of  the  Cabinet  of  the  Owl  and  the  Cabinet 
episode.  All  that  summer  and  the  next  too,  Sargent  was  much  in 
Whistler's  talk.  He  had  no  dislike  for  Sargent.  On  the  contrary 
he  held  him  in  great  friendliness.  We  have  seen  letters  in  which  he 
wrote  with  unmistakable  feeling  of  his  admiration  and  gratitude 
when  Sargent  went  out  of  his  way  for  him  in  connection  with  the 
decoration  of  the  Boston  Library — "rare  and  noble  camaraderie" 
were  his  words.  But  the  excessive  praise  of  Sargent,  then  the 
fashion,  got  on  his  nerves,  just  as  the  unintelligent  criticism  of 
Louis  Stevenson  got  on  Henley's.  How  he  felt  can  be  gathered 
from  something  he  said  to  Clifford  Addams,  from  whom  we  heard 
34  [1899-1900 


"i"r    *  M-  ''_f-~:L    ' 

i  It®    . 


LINDSEY  ROW 

ETCHING 

By  Joseph  Pennell 
Whistler  lived  in  the  houses  at  each  end  of  the  Row. 


(See  page  j<?) 


MILLBANK 

ETCHING.    M.     71 

Used  as  invitation  card  to  Thomas's  Exhibition  of  Etchings 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

it  later.  Addams  had  been  admiring  the  realistic  painting  of 
diamonds  in  one  of  Sargent's  portraits.  "Yes,"  Whistler  said, 
"arid  the  loaf  of  bread  and  bottle  of  wine  on  the  restaurant  sign 
you  could  recognize  for  what  they  are  half  a  square  away,  but  you 
do  not  praise  them  for  all  that — before  the  smallest  thing  ever  done 
by  Hals  (to  whose  lesser  work  Addams  had  compared  Sargent's) 
you  could  take  off  your  hat  and  bow  the  knee."  Whistler  praised 
Sargent's  work  when  he  thought  it  good.  An  example  of  this  we 
had  another  day  from  Mrs.  Clifford  Addams,  whom  he  told  that 
when  he  saw  Sargent's  painted  and  modelled  Crucifixion  for  the 
Boston  Library  at  the  Royal  Academy,  he  wrote  immediately  to 
Sargent  to  say  how  fine  it  was.  Sargent  understood.  He  is  reported 
to  have  said  that  there  was  more  talent  in  Whistler's  little  finger 
than  in  his  whole  body,  and  to  us  he  wrote  of  a  letter  from  Whistler 
which  he  regretted  not  having  kept  because  it  was  "a  generous 
recognition  of  something  he  considered  friendly  on  my  part 
and  would  have  been  a  record  of  feelings  that  he  is  not  often 
credited  with." 

Monday,  July  ifth.  Whistler  came  to  arrange  to  bring  Miss 
Bate  to  tea  on  Tuesday  afternoon  that  we  might  have  the  talk. 
He  asked  who  the  youth  last  night  was.  "Well,  entirely  too 
appreciative,  you  know.  Why,  he  laughed  as  if  he  were  in  it 
all  and  understood." 

Tuesday,  July  i8th.  Whistler  came  with  Miss  Bate  to  tea,  then 
left  us  to  talk,  which  Miss  Bate  did  exhaustively.  It  was  inter 
esting  to  find  how  absorbed  she  is  in  Whistler.  She  can  see 
nothing  outside  of  Whistler.  Even  the  Old  Masters  do  not  count 
for  much  to  the  student.  One  enjoys  them,  one  does  not  need  them. 
Before  she  went  to  Whistler  she  learned  nothing.  She  studied  with 
Cormon.  She  was  in  despair.  As  soon  as  she  heard  that  Whistler 
was  to  visit  the  Academic  Carmen,  she  rushed  back  to  Paris  from 
Belgium.  At  once,  it  was  another  thing.  He  taught  her  to  see — 
he  taught  her  that  to  create  something  beautiful  was  the  end  and 
object  of  art.  It  was  a  revelation.  She  saw  things  differently. 
There  was  no  question  of  her  enthusiasm.  All  the  students  did 
not  understand  him — they  thought  they  were  learning  nothing 
because  he  never  bothered  about  composition  in  the  usual  way. 
1899-1900]  35 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

These  students  left  and  went  back  to  other  studios.  But  those 
who  were  serious  and  in  earnest  stayed  on. 

Wednesday,  July,  iQth.  Whistler  sent  word  he  was  ill  in  bed. 
J.  went  at  noon.  Then  he  sent  and  asked  me  to  come  later — he 
wanted  to  hear  about  the  talk.  He  was  sprightly  for  an  invalid. 
"Everything,"  he  said,  "is  to  prove  that  Art  is  the  Science  of  the 
Beautiful — the  Science,  as  I  have  always  insisted.  It  was  Knowl 
edge  the  Old  Masters  had,  exact  Knowledge.  The  modern  painter 
has  a  few  tricks,  a  few  fads;  these  give  out  and  nothing  is  left. 
But  knowledge  is  inexhaustible,  and  Titian  was  painting  in  as 
masterly  a  manner  in  his  last  years  as  in  his  youth."  He  gave  me 
the  last  set  of  Propositions  as  he  has  issued  them  for  his  pupils, 
re-printed  from  The  Gentle  Art,  those  in  which  it  is  explained  that 
flesh  should  be  low  in  tone.  And  he  hinted  at  some  wonderful 
departure  in  his  school — some  wonderful  apprentice  system.  It 
was  like  him  that,  though  on  Monday  he  declared  he  would  not 
go  to  the  International  Meeting,  yesterday  when  he  came  to  tea 
he  was  wavering.  He  had  half  a  mind  to  go  towards  the  end  of 
the  meeting.  "Do  you  think  Joseph  would  like  it  if  I  did?"  And 
he  went,  and  heard  so  much  of  the  financial  difficulties  and  mis 
understandings  that,  when  J.  was  with  him  to-day,  he  wrote  a 
long  letter  to  the  Committee,  summing  up  the  difficulties  and  sug 
gesting  a  way  out  of  them. 

Thursday,  July  20th.  Whistler  appeared  in  the  morning  in  white 
trousers  and  waistcoat,  jaunty  black  sack  coat,  straw  hat — very 
"dandy" — on  his  way  to  see  Miss  Bate.  "Well,  you  know, you'll 
be  hearing  wonderful  things  shortly,  pupils  articled,  what?  Why 
should  I  bring  my  pupils  to  a  certain  point,  and  then  have  them 
go  back  to  other  studios?" 

Friday,  July  2ist.  Whistler  in  bed  again  and  we  did  not  see  him. 
But  Miss  Bate  came  to  show  us  the  wonderful  legal  document 
which  apprentices  her  to  him  for  five  years  in  the  old  fashion. 
She  is  not  to  show  or  sell  any  work  without  his  permission;  she  is 
to  help  him  in  his  work  if  he  wants;  she  is  to  be  in  all  things  sub- 
36  [1899-1900 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

missive;  while  he  binds  himself  to  teach  and  to  train  her.  It  was 
the  old  legal  form;  the  only  clause  left  out  was  one  that  forbade 
the  apprentice  to  marry  during  her  years  of  apprenticeship.  The 
whole  document  was  charmingly  expressed — just  the  stately 
language  to  please  Whistler,  and  with  next  to  no  punctuation  from 
beginning  to  end.  Miss  Bate  was  impressed.  She  felt  the  distinc 
tion  of  her  position,  especially  as  I  think  she  fancies,  though  she 
does  not  say  so,  that  there  will  be  no  other  student  found  to  con 
sent  to  the  same  terms.  Later,  Mrs.  Whibley  came  to  read  over 
the  letter  to  the  International  Committee. 

Whether  there  were  any  female  apprentices  in  the  past,  we  are 
not  sure.  But  at  the  Academic  Carmen,  Miss  Bate  had  no  rival 
except  Mr.  Clifford  Addams,  whom  she  married.  Talking  of  the 
apprenticeship  several  years  after  Whistler's  death,  her  memories 
were  of  his  pleasure  in  it.  The  day  the  papers  were  drawn  up,  they 
celebrated  the  occasion  by  a  lunch  at  the  Cafe  Royal,  when  he 
told  her  he  would  make  her  the  greatest  woman  artist  there  had 
ever  been — Rosa  Bonheur  had  seen  things  curiously,  with  dulness, 
Madame  Vigee  le  Brun  had  not  known  how  to  draw — but  if  she 
left  herself  in  his  hands  and  did  as  he  said,  he  would  make  her 
greater  than  any.  His  enthusiasm  was  wonderful.  He  always 
said  the  thing  he  could  not  teach  students  was  how  to  see.  That 
must  be  in  the  student — it  could  not  be  taught.  It  was  like  Whistler 
that  he  always  spoke  of  Mrs.  Addams  as  an  Irishwoman,  as  we 
supposed  she  must  be,  until  she  explained  it  was  only  that  Whistler 
decided  she  must  be  Irish  because  he  could  not  have  her  English. 
She  went  often  to  Ireland  because  her  sister  lived  there,  and  she 
was  married  there,  so  Whistler  said  she  must  be  Irish,  just  as  he 
said  he  wouldn't  be  born  in  Lowell. 

Mrs.  Whibley  is  Mrs.  Charles  Whibley  who  was  Miss  Ethel  Birnie 
Philip,  one  of  Whistler's  sisters-in-law.  His  portraits  of  her  are 
many,  in  oils  and  in  lithography. 

Saturday,  July  22nd.  Whistler  left  in  the  morning  train  for 
Dieppe,  J.  going  to  the  station  to  see  him  off. 

Monday,  August  fth.    Bank  Holiday.     Kennedy  came  to  ask  us  to 
dine  with    him.     We  arranged  to  meet   him  at  the    Cavour  at 
seven.    At  half  past  five,  he  was  back  to  say  a  telegram  had  just 
come  from  Whistler — was  to  arrive  at  seven. 
1899-1900]  37 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Almost  a  year  passed  before  another  note  was  added.  When  we 
look  back  and  consider  how  full  our  life  was  of  work  and  many 
interests,  the  wonder  is  there  were  any  notes  at  all.  Besides,  most 
of  the  following  winter  (1899—1900)  Whistler  was  in  Paris,  living 
at  the  Hotel  Chatham,  sending  us  frequent  bulletins  of  the  Boer 
War  in  the  cartoons  of  Caran  D'Ache,  saddened  by  the  death  of 
his  brother,  Dr.  Whistler,  whom  he  dearly  loved.  J.,  going  through 
Paris,  as  he  was  always  doing,  would  stop  at  the  Hotel  Chatham 
and  see  him  there,  and  there  were  always  experiences.  If  they 
came  in  together,  Whistler  would  invariably  walk  rapidly  upstairs 
— his  rooms  were  little  and  dark  on  the  first  floor — because,  he 
said,  he  never  knew  who  might  be  waiting  to  entrap  him.  One 
day  J. remembers  coming  back  and  people  jumping  up,  and  Whistler 
running  upstairs  as  fast  as  he  could,  and  then  cards  coming  up, 
and  then  his  saying,  "I  knew  it,  the  damned  Pea-Shooters  asking 
me  to  dinner,  thinking  they  can  eat  their  way  in.  Because  he 
paints,  he  thinks  he  can  know  me."  If  Whistler  was  pursued  in 
Paris,  he  was  probably  lonelier  there  than  he  cared  to  admit.  He 
laughed  at  "the  Islanders,"  but  his  laugh  was  gayest  when  he  was 
in  their  midst. 

At  the  beginning  of  May,  1900,  he  returned  to  London  and  stayed 
with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Heinemann  who  had  moved  from  Whitehall 
Court  to  Norfolk  Street,  Mayfair.  They  asked  us  to  dine  the 
evening  after  his  arrival.  J.  was  away,  as  he  often  was  at  this  time 
of  the  year,  but  E.  had  her  usual  pleasure  in  going  to  one  of  the 
pleasantest  houses  in  London,  especially  when  Whistler  was  of 
the  company:  All,  all  are  gone. 

Friday,  May  4th,  IQOO.  To  the  Heinemanns  to  dinner,  Whistler 
having  just  come  to  town  and  staying  with  them.  Mrs.  Chalmers 
Mitchell,  a  Marchesa  something — an  Englishwoman — Arthur 
Symons  and  Walter  Armstrong  there.  At  dinner,  Armstrong  full 
of  official  swagger — you  could  see  how  accustomed  he  is  to  playing 
the  Director  at  the  dinner  table  as  in  his  Gallery,  and  telling  people 
all  about  art  generally.  He  began  to  tell  Whistler.  There  never 
was  such  a  thing  as  an  artistic  country  or  period.  "Dear  me," 
said  Whistler,  "it's  very  flattering  to  find  that  I  have  made  you 
see  it  at  last,  but,  really,  you  know,  I  think  I  shall  have  to  copy 
right  my  little  things  after  this!"  Armstrong  was  furious,  lost 
his  temper  completely.  "Oh,  but  you  mean  it  one  way,  and  I 
38  [1899-1900 


&?•'--  / 
'         ' 


DR.  WHISTLER 

LITHOGRAPH.    W.     ?8 

By  permission  of  Messrs.  Kennedy  and  Co. 


THE  WHISTLER  SCHOOL 

quite  another,"  he  said.  The  Marchesa,  who  professed  contempt 
for  everybody  but  the  English,  said  that,  after  all,  the  manners 
of  the  Italians  and  French  were  all  on  the  surface.  "Well,  you 
know,  a  very  good  place  to  have  them!"  said  Whistler. 

Chalmers  Mitchell  is  the  Secretary  of  the  Zoological  Society, 
London,  and  he  and  his  wife  are  old  friends  of  Mr.  Heinemann's. 
Arthur  Symons  is  the  poet,  and  there  is  a  reference  to  this  evening 
in  his  essay  on  Whistler.  Sir  Walter  Armstrong,  after  many  years 
of  art  criticism  in  London,  was  then  Director  of  the  Irish  National 
Gallery  in  Dublin. 

Monday,  May  Jth.  Whistler,  the  Heinemanns  and  Kennedy  to 
dinner.  Whistler  had  been  to  the  Royal  Academy,  had  seen  the 
much  talked-about  Sargents.  "Really,  you  know,  it  is  incompre 
hensible,  all  this  talk  about  masterpieces.  The  big  picture  is 
nothing  more  than  the  usual  game — nothing  more  than  the  Ouless 
or  Fildes  or  Herkomer  portrait:  just  the  same  thing,  only  perhaps 
a  little  more  so.  Sargent  is  a  good  fellow,  I  like  him  extremely — 
but — really — that  is  not  great  painting,  what?  A  smudge  for  a 
nose,  a  great  brown  shadow  any  where,  anything  at  all  that  happened 
to  be  on  his  palette,  even  to  pure  white  squeezed  out  of  his  tube. 
It  is  preposterous.  And  the  little  picture — smudge  everywhere. 
Think  of  the  finish,  the  delicacy,  the  elegance,  the  repose  of  a  little 
Terborgh  or  Metsu — these  were  masters  who  could  paint  chande 
liers  and  the  rest,  and  what  a  difference!  There  is  nothing  in  the 
Academy,  nothing,  and  Sargent  is  on  a  level  with  the  others.  And 
it  is  the  same  with  his  pictures  in  Paris,  the  one  that  made  such 
excitement  here — the  man  and  the  dog  with  a  tongue — or  what 
was  it?  And  so  with  Cecilia  Beaux  and  all  of  them — even  Boldini. 
The  French,  it  is  true,  have  a  certain  sense  of  things  and  can  draw, 
and  their  work  gains  in  dignity  by  their  respect  for  tradition. 
But,  no.  Sargent  is  a  good  fellow,  yes,  but,  as  a  painter,  no  better 
than  the  rest." 

Sargent's  big  picture  in  the  Academy  this  year  was  the  portrait 
group  of  Lady  Elcho,  Mrs.  Adeane  and  Mrs.  Tennant,  and  the  small 
picture  A  Venetian  Interior,  Sargent's  Diploma  Work.  The  por- 
1899-1900]  39 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

trait  in  Paris  was  Mr.  Asher  Weriheimer  with  his  poodle  before 
which  the  British  critics  had  hovered  in  crowds  at  the  Academy 
press  view  of  i! 


Wednesday,  May  $th.  J.  back  and  Whistler,  coming  in,  stayed  on 
to  lunch  and  we  sent  for  Miss  Philip. 

Miss  Philip  is  Miss  Rosalind  Birnie  Philip,  another  sister-in-law 
whom,  immediately  after  the  death  of  his  wife,  he  adopted  as  his 
ward  and,  in  a  new  will,  made  his  heiress  and  executrix. 

Thursday,  May  loth.  Whistler  and  Miss  Philip  to  dinner.  Again 
talk  of  Sargent.  Whistler  all  satisfaction  with  the  way  his  pic 
tures  are  hung  in  Paris,  though  J.  thinks  they  might  have  been 
treated  with  more  deference.  But  Whistler  wishes  he  had  not 
sent  his  own  portrait.  "It  was  not  ready,  the  colour  has  sunk 
in,  you  cannot  see  it,  and  really  it  is  very  swagger.  " 
This  was  a  three-quarters  length  in  a  long  overcoat.  The  paint 
ing  has  disappeared,  but  he  made  the  drawing  of  it. 

Tuesday,  May  22nd.    Whistler  and  Ludovici  to  dinner. 

The  notes  were  growing  more  and  more  brief,  May  always  being 
for  J.  the  beginning  of  out-of-door  weather  and  journeys  of  work, 
for  E.  innumerable  exhibitions  in  London  and  Paris  and  as 
many  articles  to  write.  1900  was  the  year  of  the  last  Paris  Inter 
national  Exposition,  in  which  Whistler  won  two  Grands  Prix,  and 
E.  was  busier  than  usual.  The  note  for  May  22nd,  brief  because 
the  next  day  E.  started  for  one  of  her  many  visits  to  Paris  during 
the  spring  and  summer,  was  the  last  before  the  letter  from 
Mr.  Heinemann  printed  at  the  beginning,  asking  us  to  write 
the  Life. 


40  [1899-1900 


•; 


SKETCH   FROM   THE  PORTRAIT  IN  THE  1900   PARIS  EXHIBITION 

PEN-AND-INK 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


CHAPTER  V:  THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER 
JOURNAL.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED 

WE  have  quoted  Mr.  Heinemann's  letter  in  the  Introduction  to 
this  book,  and  we  have  tried  to  explain  how  we  got  to  know 
Whistler  and  what  happened  in  the  intervening  years.    As  soon  as 
it  was  arranged  that  we  were  to  write  his  Life,  Whistler  asked  us 
to  dine  with  him,  and  The  Whistler  Journal  begins  with  this  dinner. 

Whit-Sunday,  June  jrd,  1900.  Dined  at  Garlant's  with  Whistler 
and  Kennedy.  We  arrived  promptly  at  the  hour,  a  quarter  to 
eight.  At  the  stroke  of  eight,  the  waiter  turned  on  the  electric 
light  and  Whistler  appeared:  "most  dramatic,"  he  said. 
The  talk  turned,  somehow,  on  Rome  and  he  told  us  more  of  his 
two  or  three  days  there  last  year  with  Heinemann  than  ever  before. 
"Well,  you  know,  I  found  St.  Peter's  fine  with  its  great  yellow 
walls,  the  interior  too  big,  perhaps,  but  you  had  only  to  go  inside 
to  know  where  Wren  got  his  ideas — how  he,  well,  you  know,  robbed 
Peter's  to  build  Paul's !  And  I  liked  the  Vatican,  the  Swiss  Guards, 
great  big  fellows,  lolling  about  as  in  Dumas;  they  made  you  think 
of  D'Artagnan,  Aramis  and  the  others.  And  Michael  Angelo? 
A  tremendous  fellow,  yes;  the  frescoes  in  the  Sistine  Chapel, 
interesting  as  pictures,  but,  with  all  the  legs  and  arms  of  the 
figures  sprawling  everywhere,  I  could  not  see  the  decoration.  There 
can  be  no  decoration  without  repose;  a  tremendous  fellow,  but, 
not  so  much  in  the  David  and  other  things  I  was  shown  in  Rome  and 
Florence,  as  in  that  one  unfinished  picture  at  the  National  Gallery. 
There  is  often  elegance  in  the  Loggie  of  Raphael,  but  the  big 
frescoes  of  the  Stanze  did  not  interest  me.  And  Rome  was  awful — 
a  hard,  blue  sky  all  the  time,  a  glaring  sun,  and  a  strong  wind.  And 
it  was  the  same  in  Florence — a  sky  as  cold  and  hard  and  blue,  and 
a  wind  blowing." 

Later  Whistler,  when  Kennedy  asked  him  if  he  had  had  enough, 
said,  "Well,  you  know,  I  have  already  had  too  much,  and  too 
much  is  enough!" 

But  it  was  still  later,  after  he  had  had  his  ten  minutes'  nap  and 
waked  up  for  the  evening,  that  he  was  most  wonderful.  He  told 
us  the  story  of  Valparaiso  more  fully  than  we  had  ever  heard  it. 
1900]  41 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

It  happened  when  he  was  living  in  Chelsea.  "It  was  a  time  when 
many  of  the  adventurers  the  war  had  made  of  many  Southerners 
were  knocking  about  London,  hunting  for  something  to  do,  and, 
I  hardly  know  how,  but  the  something  resolved  itself  into  an 
expedition  to  go  out  to  help  the  Chileans,  and,  I  cannot  say  why, 
the  Peruvians  too.  Anyhow,  there  were  South  Americans  to  be 
helped  against  the  Spaniards.  Some  of  these  people  came  to  me 
as  a  West  Point  man,  and  asked  me  to  join,  and  it  was  all  done 
in  an  afternoon.  I  was  off  at  once  in  a  steamer  from  Southampton 
to  Panama.  We  crossed  the  Isthmus,  and  it  was  all  very  awful — 
earthquakes  and  things — and  I  vowed,  once  I  got  home,  nothing 
would  ever  bring  me  back  again.  I  found  myself  at  Valparaiso, 
and  in  Santiago,  and  I  called  on  the  President  or  whoever  the 
person  in  authority  was.  After  that,  came  the  bombardment. 
There  was  the  beautiful  bay  with  its  curving  shores,  the  town  of 
Valparaiso  on  one  side,  on  the  other  the  long  line  of  hills.  And 
there,  just  at  the  entrance  of  the  bay,  was  the  Spanish  fleet,  and, 
in  between,  the  English  fleet  and  the  French  fleet  and  the  American 
fleet  and  the  Russian  fleet,  and  all  the  other  fleets.  And  when 
the  morning  came,  with  great  circles  and  sweeps,  they  sailed  out 
into  the  open  sea,  until  the  Spanish  fleet  alone  remained.  It  drew 
up  right  in  front  of  the  town,  and  bang  went  a  shell,  and  the  bom 
bardment  began.  The  Chileans  didn't  pretend  to  defend  them 
selves.  The  people  all  got  out  of  the  way,  and  I  and  the  officials 
rode  to  the  opposite  hills  where  we  could  look  on.  The  Spaniards 
conducted  the  performance  in  the  most  gentlemanly  fashion;  they 
just  set  fire  to  a  few  of  the  houses,  and  once,  with  some  sense  of 
fun,  sent  a  shell  whizzing  over  toward  our  hills.  And  then,  I  knew 
what  a  panic  was.  I  and  the  officials  turned  and  rode  as  hard  as 
we  could,  anyhow,  anywhere.  The  riding  was  splendid  and  I,  as 
a  West  Point  man,  was  head  of  the  procession.  By  noon  the 
performance  was  over.  The  Spanish  fleet  sailed  again  into  posi 
tion,  the  other  fleets  sailed  in,  sailors  landed  to  help  put  out  the 
fires,  and  I  and  the  officials  rode  back  into  Valparaiso.  All  the 
little  girls  of  the  town  had  turned  out,  waiting  for  us,  and,  as 
we  rode  in,  called  us  Cowards!  The  Henriquetta,  the  ship  fitted 
42 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

up  in  London,  did  not  appear  till  long  after,  and  then  we  break 
fasted,  and  that  was  the  end  of  it.  But  I  made  good  use  of  the 
time,  I  painted  the  three  Valparaiso  pictures  that  are  known — 
and  two  others  that  have  disappeared.  I  gave  them  to  a  steward 
or  purser  to  bring  home  and  the  purser  kept  them.  They 
were  seen  once  in  his  house  or  rooms  in  London  by  some  one 
who  knew  me  and  my  work.  As  soon  as  he  saw  them,  he  said, 
'Why  these  must  be  by  Whistler.'  'Who's  Whistler?'  said  the 
purser.  'An  artist,'  said  the  other.  'Oh  no,'  said  the  purser, 
'they  were  painted  by  a  gentleman.'  Then  the  purser  started 
back  for  South  America  and  took  them  with  him.  Andx'you 
know,  a  tidal  wave  met  the  ship  and  swept  off  purser,  cabin,  and 
Whistlers."  The  return  journey  was  vaguer  than  the  journey  out. 
Out  of  the  general  vagueness,  looms  one  figure,  the  Marquis  de 
Marmalade,  "a  nigger  from  Hayti,  who  made  himself — well — 
obnoxious  to  me,  by  nothing  in  particular  except  his  swagger  and 
his  colour.  And,  one  day,  I  kicked  him  across  the  deck  to  the 
top  of  the  companion  way  and  there  sat  a  lady  who  proved  an 
obstacle  for  a  moment.  But  I  just  picked  up  the  Marquis  de 
Marmalade,  dropped  him  down  on  the  steps  below  her,  and  finished 
kicking  him  down  stairs."  After  that  we  believe  he  spent  the  rest 
of  the  journey  chiefly  in  his  cabin.  "And  when  I  got  back  to 
London  J  settled  down  in  Chelsea  again,  but  in  another  house — 
the  house  next  to  the  one  where  Studd  now  lives." 
Then  we  got  back  to  earlier  days  still:  the  famous  journey  to 
Cologne  with  his  friend  Ernest:  "I  had  made  a  little  money  and 
we  started  out  gloriously  to  Nancy  and  Strasbourg,  and  we  were 
coming  back  by  way  of  Cologne  and  Amsterdam.  When  we  got 
to  Cologne,  the  money  gave  out.  'What  is  to  be  done?*  asked 
Ernest,  who  having  nothing  at  all  in  prospect  anywhere,  took  the 
situation  gloomily.  e Order  breakfast!'  I  said,  which  we  did.  Then 
I  wrote  for  money  to  everybody — to  a  fellow  student,  a  Chilean 
I  had  asked  to  look  after  my  letters  in  Paris — to  Seymour  Haden — 
to  Amsterdam  where  I  thought  letters  had  been  forwarded  by  mis 
take.  We  waited.  Every  day,  we  went  to  the  Post  Office,  and 
every  day  the  officials  said,  'Nichts,  Nichts!*  until  finally  we  got 
1900]  43 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

to  be  known,  I  with  my  long  hair,  Ernest  with  his  brown  holland 
suit  and  straw  hat  now  fearfully  out  of  season.  The  boys  of  the 
town  would  be  in  wait  to  follow  us  to  the  Post  Office,  and  hardly 
would  we  get  to  the  door  before  the  official  would  shake  his  head 
and  cry  out  'Nichts,  Nichts!'  and  all  the  crowd  would  yeH'Nichts! 
Nichts!'  At  last,  to  escape  attention  we  spent  the  day  sitting  on  the 
ramparts  outside  the  town.  When  things  were  looking  desperate 
I  went  back  to  the  hotel,  put  the  copper  plates  in  my  knapsack 
and  called  the  landlord.  I  told  him  we  hadn't  a  sou,  but  here  were 
my  copper  plates  in  a  knapsack  upon  which  he  would  put  his  seal. 
'But  what  is  to  be  done  with  copper  plates?'  asked  the  landlord. 
They  were  to  be  kept  with  the  greatest  care  as  the  work  of  a  dis 
tinguished  artist — once  back  in  Paris,  I  would  send  money  to  pay 
the  bill,  and  the  landlord  would  then  immediately  send  the  knap 
sack.  He  was  a  good  sort,  for  he  agreed,  and  even  gave  us  the 
last  breakfast  I  asked  for,  and  Lina  the  maid  slipped  her  last 
groschen  into  my  hand.  Then,  with  a  supply  of  paper  and  pencils, 
we  started  off  for  Paris  on  foot.  It  was  the  time  of  the  autumn 
fairs  and  we  paid  our  way  by  making  portraits  for  a  few  sous. 
We  even  joined  a  lady  who  played  the  violin  and  a  gentleman  who 
played  the  harp,  and  we  gave  entertainments  in  all  the  villages  we 
passed  through,  sleeping  in  the  straw,  and  tramping  it  on  off  days. 
My  little  patent  leather  shoes  were  all  in  bits  and  had  to  be  patched 
together  in  the  evening  at  every  town  or  village.  And  one  day 
when  it  rained,  and  I  saw  Ernest  tramping  solemnly  before  me 
through  the  mud,  the  water  dripping  from  his  hat  and  his  coat  a 
wet  rag,  I  shrieked  with  laughter.  'But  what  would  you  have?' 
said  Ernest,  (les  saisons  m'ont  toujours  devance*  When  we  got  to 
Aix-la-Chapelle,  it  was  all  right  again.  I  went  to  see  the  American 
Consul,  got  some  money,  and  did  the  rest  of  the  journey  in  comfort. 
And  the  landlord  was  paid,  and  the  knapsack  of  etchings  returned, 
and,  you  know,  some  years  later  when  I  was  passing  through 
Cologne  with  my  mother  and  had  left  her  in  her  hotel  in  the  even 
ing,  I  went  off  to  find  the  old  hotel  and  the  landlord.  And  the 
daughter  of  the  house,  who  had  grown  up  in  the  meanwhile, 
recognized  me  at  once,  and  many  bottles  were  opened." 
44  [1900 


PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER   FROM   TITLE  TO  THE  FRENCH   SET 

ETCHING.  M.  25 

(See  £ag«  49) 


UNPUBLISHED  TITLE  TO  FRENCH  SET 

ETCHING 

Grolier  Club  Supplement.    By  permission  of  the  Grolier  Club 


(See  page  49) 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

We  had  another  story  of  a  delightful  creature,  always  without  a 
sou,  he  knew  in  those  days,  the  Count  de  Montezuma.  "This  was 
the  sort  of  thing  he  would  do — amazing!  He  started  one  day  for 
Charenton  on  the  steamboat,  his  pockets  as  usual  empty  and  he 
was  there  for  as  long  as  he  could  stay.  The  boat  broke  down,  a 
sergent  de  ville  came  on  board  and  ordered  everybody  off  except 
the  Captain  and  his  family  who  happened  to  be  with  him.  The 
Montezuma  paid  no  attention.  With  arms  crossed  he  walked  up 
and  down,  looking  at  no  one.  They  waited,  but  he  walked  on, 
up  and  down,  up  and  down,  looking  at  no  one.  The  sergent  de 
ville  repeated  'tout  le  monde  a  terre'  The  Montezuma  gave  no 
sign.  lEt  vous?9  the  sergent  de  ville  asked  at  last.  'Je  suis  de  la 
famille!'  said  the  Montezuma.  Opposite,  staring  at  him,  stood 
the  captain  with  his  wife  and  children.  'You  see/  said  the  sergent 
de  ville,  'the  captain  does  not  know  you,  he  says  you  are  not  of 
the  family.  You  must  go.'  'Moi'  and  the  Montezuma  drew  himself 
up  proudly,  lMoi,  Je  suis  le  batard!" 

Garlant's,  where  we  dined,  is  the  hotel  in  Suffolk  Street,  Pall  Mall, 
to  which  at  this  period  Whistler  went  when  in  London,  unless  he 
stopped  at  Mr.  Heinemann's — "keeping  house  with  Heinemann," 
he  said.  It  was  amusing  to  us  that  he  chose  Garlant's,  for  close 
by,  in  the  same  street,  is  the  gallery  of  the  British  Artists  whom 
he  therefore  exposed  to  the  constant  risk  of  an  embarrassing  meet- 
ting  with  their' former  President,  while  the  hotel  was  Sir  Seymour 
Haden's  London  headquarters  and  the  brothers-in-law  had  not 
been  on  speaking  terms  for  years. 

The  talk  often  turned  on  Rome  after  the  winter  of  1899  when 
Whistler  was  there  for  the  first  time  on  his  way  to  Heinemann's 
wedding  at  Porto  D'Anzio,  the  home  of  Mrs.  Heinemann — Magda 
Sindici  before  her  marriage — and  Rome,  though  disappointing, 
made  a  strong  impression.  Mr.  J.  Kerr-Lawson's  account  of  his 
stay  in  Florence  we  printed  in  the  Life.  Together,  they  visited 
the  Uffizi,  and  its  gallery  of  artists'  portraits  painted  by  themselves. 
His  would  be  there  one  day,  Lawson  told  him;  the  day  never  came. 
After  his  death  some  one  in  Florence  realized  the  mistake  of  not 
having  invited  him  and  Herbert  Home  wrote  to  J.,  asking  if  a 
portrait  of  Whistler  might  be  obtained,  but  it  was  too  late.  J.  sug 
gested  that  they  apply  to  Miss  Philip,  but  no  portrait  of  Whistler  is 
1900]  45 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

yet  in  the  Uffizi.  If  the  present  owner  would  send  the  McCulloch 
portrait,  which  Freer  had  not  the  sense  to  buy,  he  might  stand 
a  better  chance  of  being  remembered  as  the  intelligent  patron  of 
Whistler.  One  or  two  incidents  of  the  stay  in  Florence,  Lawson 
omitted  from  the  account  sent  us,  though  not  in  talking  it  over. 
Among  other  things,  he  told  us  of  the  meeting  between  Ricci,  the 
Director  of  the  Uffizi,  and  Herbert  Home  at  an  evening  reception. 

April  28th,  1906.  Ricci  asked  Home  who  were  the  living  English 
painters  whose  portraits  of  themselves  he  ought  to  have  for  the 
gallery.  Home  said  he  must  think  it  over.  And  he  did.  And  he 
suggested  Holman  Hunt,  Sargent,  and  Wilson  Steer  who,  naturally, 
were  willing.  Then  Home  told  Kerr-Lawson  what  he  had  done. 
"And  Whistler?"  Lawson  said,  and  he  advised  Home  to  write  to  J. 
and  ask  if  the  McCulloch  portrait  or  any  other  as  good  was  to  be 
had,  but  Home  did  not  follow  his  advice  at  the  time.  Shortly 
after,  Lavery  came  to  Florence  and  suddenly  everyone  was  saying 
what  a  great  man  he  was,  and  why  was  not  his  portrait  of  himself 
in  the  Uffizi,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  excitement  he  was  asked  for  it. 
Extraordinary,  was  Lawson's  comment,  the  way  Lavery  on  the 
Continent  seemed  to  reap  Whistler's  laurels.  Whistler  passed 
through  Florence  unnoticed;  Lavery  was  feted,  asked  to  paint  his 
portrait  for  the  Uffizi,  given  banquets — getting  commissions,  bor 
rowing  easels,  using  packing  boxes  for  thrones,  altogether  making 
a  tremendous  success.  And  it  was  the  same  everywhere.  The 
fault,  Lawson  suggested,  was  Whistler's.  Whistler  irritated  by 
foolish  talk  of  Sargent,  thought  to  belittle  him  by  praise  of  Lavery 
— to  pull  down  the  great  man  by  putting  up  the  little.  We  said  it 
was  not  like  Whistler.  But  Lawson  insisted  that  it  was  so — 
Whistler  told  him,  at  a  moment  when  praise  of  Sargent  was  in 
every  man's  mouth,  that  Sargent  was  a  mediocre  painter — any 
one  of  the  Glasgow  School  was  better,  there  was — giving  the  first 
name  that  occurred  to  him — Lavery,  for  example.  The  chances 
were  Whistler  had  only  just  heard  of  Lavery,  but  he  served 
his  purpose  as  well  as  another.  If,  however,  Whistler  repeated 
this  to  half  a  dozen  or  more  people,  it  was  enough  to  make 
Lavery's  reputation. 
46  [1900 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

The  whole  story  is  an  absurd  misconception  of  the  character  of 
Whistler,  who  was  not  vindictive  over  the  success  of  other  artists. 
But  it  is  typical  of  the  sort  of  thing  said  of  him  even  by  men  sup 
posed  to  appreciate  him.  As  a  matter  of  fact  he  had  known  Lavery 
for  years,  and  Guthrie  too  and  always,  as  they  have  told  us,  they 
admired  him.  Of  the  beginning  of  their  friendliness,  Lavery  has 
given  us  an  account.  He  had  only  seen  Whistler  once  or  twice, 
rather  formally,  when  one  day  he  met  him  about  four  in  the  after 
noon  at  Piccadilly  Circus.  "Come,"  said  Whistler,  "and  have  a 
cocktail,"  and  they  went  to  the  Criterion  and  sat  there  for  two  or 
three  hours.  From  there  they  went  to  Lavery's  hotel  and  dined, 
and  Whistler  talked  and  talked  and  never  left  until  four  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  fresh  as  ever,  but  leaving  Lavery  exhausted. 
Another  incident,  recalled  another  day  by  Lawson,  is  as  typical  of 
the  persistency  with  which  the  English,  even  as  far  away  as 
Florence,  kept  up  the  old  Whistler  tradition. 

September  ist,  1906.  Lawson,  wanting  to  arrange  something  pleas 
ant  for  the  day  Whistler  was  in  Florence,  asked  Mrs.  Janet  Ross 
if  she  would  not  like  him  to  bring  Whistler  to  lunch  at  her  house 
near  Settignano,  a  visit  to  her  being  one  of  the  things  the  "  Loiterer" 
in  Florence  was  supposed  to  want  most  to  do  after  seeing  the 
Bargello  and  the  Uffizi.  "Oh,"  Mrs.  Ross  said,  "he's  a  dreadful 
little  cad,  but  bring  him,"  and  she  rather  made  a  point  that  he 
should  be  brought — she  had  known  him  in  London,  had  been  to 
his  breakfasts.  The  next  day,  toward  lunch  time,  Lawson  said  to 
Whistler,  "why  not  go  out  to  Mrs.  Ross's  house  and  lunch  with 
her?"  "Who's  that?"  Whistler  asked,  "Mrs.  Ross,  that  dreadful 
old  bore?"  and  he  wouldn't  hear  of  it.  Lawson  remembers  that 
he  was  amusing  about  Loeser  and  Berenson — one  of  them,  he  said, 
had  strayed  into  the  studio  and  bought  things  and  carried  them 
off,  but  the  other — Berenson — never  ventured. 

J.  remembers  one  of  the  tribe  turning  up  in  the  Rue  du  Bac  and 
describing  to  Whistler  his  own  pictures  and  Whistler's  comment 
after  he  had  gone.  "Well,  you  know,  he  knows  a  great  deal  more 
about  my  things  than  I  do,  but  then  he  don't  know  enough  to 
know  that  everything  he  does  know  is  wrong!"  When  you  reflect 
that  these  are  the  people  who  know  everything  about  the  artists 
of  the  past,  you  do  not  wonder  at  their  ignorance  of  everything 
1900]  47 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

going  on  about  them.  This  was  Whistler's  only  visit  to  Florence 
and  Rome. 

Why  Whistler  went  to  Chile,  he  never  explained  to  us  or,  as  far 
as  we  can  find  out,  to  anybody  else;  just  as  he  never  explained  why 
he  did  not  go  home  during  the  Civil  War,  though  it  would  have 
seemed  more  in  accord  with  the  West  Point  traditions  to  which 
he  held  all  his  life,  and  though  his  brother,  Dr.  William  Whistler, 
was  a  Surgeon  in  the  Southern  Army.  The  true  explanation 
probably  is  that,  as  Whistler  knew,  Art  is  a  jealous,  no  less  than 
"a  whimsical  goddess, "and  demands  the  undivided  time  and  ser 
vice  of  the  artist.  But  it  is  curious,  because  during  the  Boer  and 
Spanish  wars  he  worked  himself  up  into  the  greatest  excitement, 
endlessly  discussing  them,  and  yet  in  the  Civil  War  and  the  Franco- 
German  war  he  took  no  personal  part.  By  the  grace  of  God,  he 
did  not  live  through  the  world-ruining  war  that  we  have  not  yet 
seen  the  end  of.  Mr.  McQueen,  a  young  Oxford  undergraduate 
when  we  knew  him,  told  us  that  his  father  was  in  Valparaiso  when 
Whistler  was  there,  that  he  put  Whistler  up  at  his  Club,  and  that 
it  was  from  the  Club  windows  that  the  beautiful  upright  Valparaiso 
was  painted. 

Studd,  to  whose  house  in  Lindsey  Row  Whistler  referred,  was 
Arthur  Studd,  for  some  unknown  reason  called  Peter  by  his  friends. 
His  admiration  for  Whistler  was  great.  In  the  end  it  led  him  far 
astray  in  his  interpretation  of  "the  Master's  wishes,"  but  a  proof 
of  his  sincerity  is  shown  in  his  purchase  of  The  Little  White  Girl,  one 
of  the  Cremorne  series,  and  a  very  beautiful  nocturne.  He  left 
the  three  pictures  to  the  British  nation  on  the  wise  condition  that 
they  should  be  hung  at  once  in  the  National  Gallery,  Trafalgar 
Square.  And  yet,  when  the  International  gave  the  Whistler 
Memorial  Exhibition  in  1905,  Studd  protested  in  The  Times  and 
other  papers  that  Whistler  did  not  wish  an  exhibition  of  any  of  his 
works  in  London,  and  Whistler  told  J.  and  Heinemann  that  he  did 
not  wish  any  of  them  hung  in  an  English  public  gallery.  Studd 
also  opposed  the  scheme  of  the  London  Memorial  for  London, 
but  with  no  success,  for  Whistler's  friends,  with  very  few  excep 
tions,  supported  it.  The  money  was  obtained.  The  failure  was 
Rodin's.  His  design  was  rejected.  We  are  sorry  the  pictures 
remain  in  London,  where  Whistler  certainly  did  not  want  them, 
though  it  may  at  the  present  time  be  the  safest  place  for  them. 
More  than  once  he  said  that  no  "eccentricity"  of  his  was  to  go  into 
the  National  Gallery,  that  the  Louvre  was  good  enough  for  him. 
We  have  seen  a  letter  from  him  in  which  he  refers  to  one  he 
wrote  to  Studd  to  beg  him,  if  The  Little  White  Girl  ever  left  the 
48  [1900 


DROUET 

ETCHING.  M.  55 


RIAULT 

ETCHING.  M.  65 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

family,  to  promise  not  to  leave  it  to  any  gallery  in  England.  He 
did  not  want  his  pictures  to  go  even  into  private  English  collec 
tions.  They  might  be  sold  to  Scotchmen,  Irishmen,  Americans, 
Frenchmen,  but  never  to  an  Englishman.  However,  if,  as  it  has 
turned  out,  Studd's  pictures — and  the  same  is  true  of  Mr.  Alexan 
der's — had  to  remain  in  London,  we  are  glad  they  are  the  property 
of  the  British  nation.  And  so,  Studd,  in  defiance  of  Whistler,  did 
great  good.  We  have  not  seen  The  Little  White  Girl  and  the 
Nocturnes  in  the  National  Gallery  and  we  like  to  remember  them 
as  they  hung — the  only  pictures  on  the  wall — in  Studd's  drawing- 
room  in  the  old  Lindsey  Row  house  looking  out  on  the  river,  near 
where  they  had  been  painted  and  where  they  seemed  to  belong. 
Ernest  was  Ernest  Delannoy,  a  nephew  of  Benjamin-Constant, 
the  statesman.  The  story  of  his  life  was  finished  for  us  a  few  years 
later  by  Drouet,  the  sculptor,  Whistler's  friend  to  whom  we  owe 
many  facts  of  Whistler's  student  days  in  Paris.  There  is  a  note 
of  our  first  visit  to  him. 

May  Qth,  1907.  Drouet  asked  us  to  come  and  see  him  in  the  Rue 
de  Seine;  a  little  court,  an  old  stairway,  and  two  or  three  small 
rooms,  crammed  with  pictures  and  drawings,  from  floor  to  ceiling, 
on  easels,  stacked  in  corners,  and  almost  all  copies  or  fakes.  In  the 
largest  room,  a  bed  in  one  corner  and  a  table  with  old  velvet  as 
cover,  hardly  space  for  two  or  three  chairs;  in  the  adjoining  room, 
the  washstand.  As  he  told  the  story,  Ernest  and  Whistler  both 
wore  the  same  sort  of  linen  suits  for  their  journey,  and  so  Ernest 
was  able  to  pose  for  the  portrait,  all  but  the  face,  in  the  title  to 
The  French  Set  of  etchings.  Ernest  could  not  stand  London, 
where  he  went  to  stay  with  Whistler,  it  was  trop  triste.  But  he 
was  in  misery  after  he  came  back  to  Paris:  he  could  get  no  work. 
He  had  not  money  for  sufficient  food.  In  the  end,  he  went  mad  and 
died  in  a  lunatic  asylum. 

Whistler's  adventures  in  Alsace,  as  he  recalled  them,  gave  us  one 
of  many  glimpses  of  his  gaiety  as  a  student — the  gaiety  so  bewilder 
ing  to  the  solemn  Britons,  his  fellow  students,  that  Sir  Edward 
Poynter  brought  back  to  London  the  myth  he  never  ceased  to 
believe  in  of  Whistler — the  Idle  Apprentice.  It  was  the  one  impres 
sion  he  gave  in  his  speech  at  the  Royal  Academy  banquet  the  year 
following  Whistler's  death;  his  usual  suggestion  in  private  as,  when 
1900]  49 

4 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

looking  over  some  Whistlers  at  the  Fine  Art  Society's  that  same 
spring,  "A  genius,"  he  said  to  Mr.  Langton  Douglas,  "but  the 
devil  wouldn't  work!"  Whistler,  never  a  member  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  was  worth  a  sneer  from  Poynter  after  his  death — but 
he  was  not  elected  because  the  American  members  did  not  want  him. 
If  sometimes,  as  on  this  Third  of  June,  Whistler  spent  the  evening 
recalling  his  early  life,  on  other  evenings  he  told  us  nothing  of 
the  past.  But,  as  we  agreed,  he  was  to  talk  when  he  felt  like  it, 
and  we  were  to  listen.  We  had  the  sense  not  to  bother  him  as 
most  people  did.  Had  we  bothered  him,  we  would  have  heard 
nothing  at  all. 

Tuesday,  June  $th,  1900.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Janvier  to  dinner,  and 
about  half  past  nine  Whistler  and  Kennedy  came  in.  I  was  vexed 
to  see  that  Whistler's  most  gallant  manners  lavished  in  an  opening 
remark  to  Mrs.  Janvier,  who  was  sitting  nearest  to  him,  were  lost 
upon  her  as  she  is  rather  deaf  and  did  not  hear.  And  his  gallantry 
is  too  charming  to  lose.  He  consented  to  Gray's  going  up  to  the 
studio  to-morrow  to  begin  photographing  the  pictures  there  for 
the  book.  Kennedy  asked  us  to  dinner  at  Garlant's,  but  it  was 
decided  they  should  both  come  to  us  to-morrow — "we  shall  have 
a  so  much  better  dinner  with  you,"  Whistler  said,  "and  then,  you 
know,  they  never  have  any  sweet  things  round  there" — ! 

On  Sunday  evening,  the  first  note  shows,  Whistler  began  at  once 
to  give  us  facts  of  his  life  in  the  course  of  his  talk,  as  he  had  prom 
ised.  It  was  a  greater  proof  of  his  interest  in  the  book  when,  two 
evenings  later,  he  came  to  our  flat  to  see  about  having  his  pictures 
photographed.  Nobody  knew  better  than  Whistler  that  to  photo 
graph  pictures  successfully  takes  long  and  calls  for  special  arrange 
ments  of  light,  and  that,  while  it  was  going  on,  his  studio  would 
be  disorganized.  We  wondered,  therefore,  how  he  would  feel  when 
it  was  time  to  begin,  but  he  accepted  all  the  arrangements  Mr. 
Gray  proposed.  Gray  was  W.  E.  Gray,  one  of  the  best  photog 
raphers  for  this  kind  of  work  in  London.  He  had  already  made 
photographs  for  Whistler  of  which  Whistler  approved.  Later,  at 
the  trial  which  Miss  Philip  brought  against  us  and  Heinemann  to 
prevent  the  publication  of  our  book,  and  which  she  lost,  these 
photographs  done  for  us  were  produced  by  her  in  court  for  some 
unknown  reason,  as  they  proved  we  had  been  authorized  to  have 
them  made.  Not  content  with  this,  Miss  Philip  in  the  witness  box 

50  [1900 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

stated  that  it  was  Whistler's  wish  that  J.  should  go  round  Europe 
and  America  on  a  bicycle  making  snapshots  of  his  pictures  wherever 
J.  found  them.  But  her  statements  were  so  amazing  that  nobody 
thought  it  worth  while  to  cross-examine  her. 

Mr.  Janvier  was  Thomas  A.  Janvier.  He  and  Mrs.  Janvier  were 
living  in  London  at  the  time,  and  we  saw  much  of  them. 

Wednesday,  June  6th.  Whistler  and  Kennedy  to  dinner.  A  quiet 
dinner.  Joseph  had  been  up  in  the  studio  most  of  the  day,  super 
intending  the  photographing,  and  Whistler  seemed  satisfied  with 
what  Gray  was  doing.  He  slept  more  than  usual,  and  Kennedy, 
ruthlessly  carried  him  off,  just  when  he  really  waked  up  and  was 
in  the  humour  to  talk. 

Sunday,  June  loth.  Miss  Philip,  Whistler  and  Kennedy  to  dinner 
to  celebrate  Whistler's  Grands  Prix  and  J's.  Gold  Medals,  Whist 
ler,  of  course,  treating  the  occasion  with  all  solemnity  and  dis 
tinction — arriving  with  Miss  Philip,  both  in  evening  dress — we 
were  not,  which  he  evidently  thought  a  slight  on  our  part.  "  Shock 
ing!  Shocking! — your  want  of  ceremony,"  he  said.  Just  before 
we  sat  down  to  dinner,  Cole  came  in  most  unexpectedly;  as  the 
other  Gold  Medallist,  it  was  appropriate,  but  things  did  not  go 
quite  as  they  ought  to  have  gone  to  begin  with.  Cole  was  still 
full  of  the  diet  question.  He  now  lives  chiefly  on  rhubarb  tops — 
they  have  such  a  "foody"  taste,  his  son  thinks.  "Dear  me!  Poor 
fellow!"  Whistler  told  him,  "it  sounds  as  if  once  long,  long  ago 
he  had  really  eaten,  and  still  has  a  dim  memory  of  what  food  is!" 
"And  spinach,"  Cole  added,  " it's  fine.  We  eat  it  raw.  It's  wonder 
ful,  the  things  it  does  for  you!"  "But  what  does  it  do  for  you?" 
Whistler  asked.  And  Cole  began  a  dissertation  on  the  juices  of 
the  stomach.  But  that  was  enough.  Whistler  would  have  no 
more.  "Well,  you  know,  when  you  begin  to  talk  about  the  stomach 
and  its  juices  it's  time  to  stop  dining."  As  he  talked  Cole  was 
eating  meat  and  drinking  wine  quite  heartily.  The  evening  was 
not  over  successful. 

Whistler,  like  all  true  artists,  hated  awards  at  exhibitions,  especially 
if  he  did  not  get  the  first  one.  For  long,  second-and-third-class 
1900]  51 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

honours  usually  came  his  way,  as  in  Munich  when  he  arranged  a 
show  for  the  British  Artists,  in  which  they  did  not  play  up,  and 
he  received  a  second-class  medal  and  thanked  the  Directors  for 
their  second-hand  compliment.  In  Paris  he  got  only  one  third- 
class  medal,  and  in  the  first  Venice  International  a  third-class  prize. 
But  his  objections  came  less  from  the  fact  that  he  was  badly  treated 
for  many  years  by  international  jurors  with  no  understanding  of 
his  art,  than  from  his  realization  that  money  prizes  for  works  of 
art  were  simply  an  incentive  to  graft  and  dishonesty.  In  no  land 
has  this  system  been  carried  to  such  an  extreme  as  in  the  United 
States,  where  large  cash  prizes  are  annually  awarded  in  large 
numbers  of  American  exhibitions  to  American  artists  only.  As 
far  as  we  are  aware,  not  a  single  one  of  these  cash  prizes  was  ever 
awarded  to  Whistler,  and  the  majority  of  the  men  and  women  who 
have  won  them  are  unknown  internationally.  Further,  Whistler 
was  never  made  a  member  of  the  National  Academy  of  Design  and 
he  belonged  to  the  Society  of  American  Artists  only  for  a  year  or  so. 
The  consequence  was  that,  in  the  few  societies  in  which  he  had  any 
controlling  voice,  he  absolutely  opposed  money  prizes,  and  in  the 
International  would  not  allow  even  medals  to  be  given.  And  in 
these  matters  he  was  right. 

However,  when  awards  were  given  at  an  exhibition  and  the  highest 
were  bestowed  upon  him,  he  accepted  them  as  practical  signs  of 
the  appreciation  of  his  work.  This  was  why  he  was  pleased  when, 
at  the  Paris  Exposition  of  1900,  he  was  awarded  a  Grand  Prix  for 
Painting  and  another  for  Etching,  and  he  did  not  conceal  his 
pleasure.  He  was  the  more  pleased  perhaps  because  he  had  passed 
through  a  moment  of  doubt,  of  which  we  have  a  note: — 

January  i8th,  1908.  Mr.  Charles  Prince  tells  us  of  the  morning  he 
went  to  see  Whistler  off  for  London  at  the  Gare  du  Nord  and  found 
him  on  the  platform  in  great  agitation.  "O,"  he  said,  "if  only 
you  had  come  five  minutes  sooner!"  And  explained  that  he  had 
just  read  in  one  of  the  Paris  papers  a  notice  of  the  Exposition  and 
his  pictures  were  criticised  in  a  way  that  convinced  him  something 
must  have  happened  to  them  or  that  they  had  been  badly  hung, 
and  he  wanted  to  see  to  make  sure.  But  his  trunk  was  registered 
and  in  the  luggage  van,  and  it  was  too  late.  Mr.  Prince  got  his 
trunk  and  a  porter  to  carry  it  to  a  cab,  and  they  drove  away  and 
left  it  at  the  Hotel.  Then  they  breakfasted  well,  and  drove  on  to 
the  Exposition  and  went  straight  to  his  picture.  He  looked  at  it 
52  [1900 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

in  silence  for  a  few  minutes,  hid  his  face  in  his  hands — just  like  a 
girl,  was  Mr.  Prince's  description — and  said  "Why  it's  all  right!" 
Afterwards,  he  was  looking  at  other  things,  and  one  of  the  attend 
ants,  an  American — most  of  them  were  students  who  had  got  the 
post  for  the  summer — came  up  to  Prince  to  ask  who  Whistler  was. 
Prince  told  him.  The  man's  eyes  opened.  "What!  He's  the 
biggest  man  we've  ever  had  and  we've  had  Kings!" 

J.  received  Gold  Medals  for  Etching  and  Drawing,  and  when  the 
news  came  of  the  honours  they  both  had  won,  we  celebrated  the 
events,  as  we  celebrated  all  things  in  those  days,  with  a  little 
dinner.  The  announcement  of  the  awards  had  been  officially 
received  while  we  were  still  in  Paris.  Then  Heinemann  gave 
Whistler  a  dinner,  and  they  crowned  him  with  laurel — or  sprays 
from  a  plant  in  the  dining-room — and  Whistler  was  delighted. 
Now  it  was  our  turn  to  celebrate. 

Cole  is  Timothy* Cole,  to  whom  a  Gold  Medal  was  awarded  for 
his  Wood  Engravings.  He  is  a  remarkable  man  as  well  as  a  re 
markable  engraver,  and  Whistler  enjoyed  meeting  him  at  our 
dinner  table  two  or  three  years  before  when  he  was  in  London 
engraving  the  series  of  English  Masterpieces  for  The  Century.  He 
had  been  away  from  London  for  some  time,  the  mistake  over  the 
practical  joke  of  which  we  have  written  had  been  forgotten,  and 
nothing  could  have  been  more  unexpected  and  appropriate  than 
his  sudden  appearance.  He  was  then,  as  we  hope  for  his  sake  he 
is  not  now,  an  ardent  vegetarian,  though  not  a  bigot.  He  ate  no 
meat  at  home,  for  long  he  lived  chiefly  on  apples  and  nuts,  but 
we  never  knew  him  to  refuse  meat  when  he  came  to  us. 

Monday,  June  nth,  1900.  Whistler  alone  to  dinner.  I  had  written 
that  it  was  Joseph's  last  dinner,  and  that  Joseph  would  be  out  all 
afternoon  but  would  be  home  at  eight.  Whistler's  answer  was 
that  he  would  come  at  eight,  which,  of  course,  meant  dinner. 
When  he  came,  "Well  you  know,"  was  his  greeting,  "you  will 
feel  about  me,  as  I  did  in  the  old  days  about  the  man  I  could  never 
ask  to  dinner,  because  he  was  always  there!  I  couldn't  ask  him 
to  sit  down,  because  there  he  always  was  already  in  his  chair!" 
He  was  much  pleased  because  he  heard  that  when  the  International 
jury  were  voting  for  the  American  Medals  of  Honour,  his  were 
voted  for  unanimously  and  were  read  out  the  first  of  the  list  to 
1900]  53 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

unanimous  applause.  He  read  us  an  amusing  letter  from  the 
Manager  of  the  Hotel  Chatham  congratulating  him  on  the  award, 
which  he,  of  all  men,  so  well  deserved.  He  promises  to  let  Gray 
finish  photographing.  The  South  African  position  enchanted  him: 
Mrs.  Kruger  receiving  the  British  Army,  while  the  Boers  retired 
with  all  they  wanted,  and  went  on  capturing  the  British  soldiers 
wholesale — for  the  news  has  just  come  of  the  surrender  of  six 
hundred  of  a  Derbyshire  Regiment.  He  liked  too  The  Star's 
suggestion  that  Buller  might  yet  have  to  march  to  the  relief  of 
Roberts  at  Pretoria.  A  quiet  evening,  but  delightful. 

Tuesday,  June  ipth.  Whistler  called  in  the  evening,  but  only  for 
a  few  minutes.  He  thought  Joseph  was  back.  He  had  been  out 
of  town  with  Wimbush,  who  took  him  to  Amersham,  beyond 
Pinner,  where  he  had  meant  to  stay.  "Well,  I  could  see  that 
towards  twilight,  it  might  be  pretty  in  a  curious  way,  but  it  was 
not  really  pretty,  and  so  I  came  back.  I  want  to  go  somewhere, 
for  I  have  promised  to  paint  two  landscapes."  He  says  he  will 
come  on  Sunday  when  Mrs.  Custer  and  the  Lungrens  are  to  be  here. 

From  the  earliest  days  Whistler  was  bored  in  the  country  and  made 
a  jest  of  his  boredom.  He  never  stayed  long  in  it  anywhere  except 
at  Speke  Hall,  the  Leylands'  place  near  Liverpool,  and  there  the 
sea  was  close  by  and  his  chief  work  was  painting  or  etching  his 
many  portraits  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Leyland  and  their  children.  At 
first,  when  he  was  young  and  trying  everything,  he  sometimes  went 
to  week-end  parties  and  shooting  parties.  Sir  Frederick  Milner 
wrote  us  a  story  of  Whistler's  visit  to  his  place.  The  first  morning 
he  started  off  with  the  rest  to  shoot,  in  little  light  shoes  more 
appropriate  to  a  drawing-room.  Sir  Frederick,  a  much  larger  man, 
lent  him  a  pair  of  shooting  boots  in  which  he  was  the  most  comic 
sight  imaginable.  A  hare  suddenly  sat  up  and  looked  at  him. 
Whistler  fired  and  shot  it  dead.  Then  he  threw  down  the  gun — he 
had  had  enough — he  had  never  shot  anything  before — he  wanted 
the  experience  and  it  was  enough.  It  must  have  been  before 
this  that  he  tried  his  luck  at  the  Leylands'  when  his  own  report 
was,  "I  rather  fancied  I  shot  part  of  a  hare  for  I  thought  I  saw  the 
fluff  of  its  fur  flying.  I  know  I  hit  a  dog  for  I  saw  the  keeper  taking 
out  the  shot!"  Sport  amused  him  no  more  than  the  week-end. 
We  know  of  his  attempting  no  other  variety  save  cycling,  and  then, 

54  [1900 


SPEKE  HALL 

DRY-POINT.    M.    96 


LYME  REGIS 

WATER-COLOUR 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Knowles 


(See  page  14) 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

as  we  wrote  in  the  Life,  he  fell  off  his  wheel  and  was  consoled  only 
because  the  fall  was  in  a  rose  bush.  But  the  truth  is,  he  soon 
wearied  when  away  from  town,  and  even  the  ocean  he  could 
exhaust,  as  he  laughed  in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler  from  St. 
Ives.  If  his  friends  were  in  the  country  he  would  urge  them  to 
come  up  to  town  for  a  breath  of  fresh  air,  for  which  he  would 
promptly  run  up  himself  if  he  was  the  unfortunate  exile.  He  hoped 
the  country  would  do  her  no  harm,  he  wrote  to  Lady  Colin  Camp 
bell — it  could  not  make  her  more  beautiful.  Altogether,  the  grass 
hopper  was  a  burden!  He,  or  rather  the  world,  lost  by  this  preju 
dice,  for  it  was  the  cause  of  canvases  left  unfinished,  landscapes, 
marines,  portraits  thrown  aside  because  he  could  not  resist  the 
call  of  the  town.  An  unfortunate  example  is  a  small,  practically 
unknown  portrait  of  Mr.  George  Lucas  which  it  would  be 
doubly  interesting  to  have,  now  that  Mr.  Lucas'  collection  of 
Whistler  prints,  letters  and  papers — a  valuable  collection — is  in  the 
Maryland  Institute  in  Baltimore.  He  was  an  old  friend  of  the 
Whistler  family,  a  most  affectionate  and  useful  friend  of  Whistler 
himself  in  the  early  days  and  until  the  end,  though  they  saw  less 
of  each  other  after  Whistler's  marriage.  He  was  another  of  the 
remarkable  old  men  our  search  for  Whistler  material  introduced 
us  to.  E.  has  vivid  memories  of  the  winter  morning  in  Paris,  when 
M.  Duret  took  her  to  see  him  in  his  apartment. 

February  nth,  1904.  He  was  then  eighty — like  a  prophet  with 
his  white  beard,  and  in  his  long  grey  soft  flannel  coat  and  grey  skull 
cap,  sitting  in  a  fairly  small  room,  delightfully  littered  with  his 
collections;  the  walls  hung  as  close  as  possible  with  pictures — two 
Corots,  a  Daumier,  a  beautiful  little  Fantin  like  a  Diaz,  a  Dau- 
bigny,  a  Hervier  and  more  than  I  had  time  to  look  at,  against  the 
walls,  two  or  three  little  cabinets  covered  with  small  bronzes  by 
Barye  and  a  few  low  cases  filled  with  portfolios,  labelled,  Whistler, 
Manet,  Jacque.  He  had  just  got  the  news  of  the  great  fire  in  Balti 
more.  It  was  the  business  part  of  the  city  which  had  been  burnt 
down,  the  old  part,  and  his  house,  the  house  where  he  was  born, 
was  almost  in  the  middle  of  it  and  therefore  must  have  been  de 
stroyed.  He  showed  me  a  map  of  Baltimore  to  explain,  and  for  a 
while  could  talk  of  nothing  else. 

At  last,  he  began  to  talk  about  Whistler,  and  brought  out  etchings 
and  water-colours  and  the  portrait  of  himself  in  oils  which  Whistler 
1900]  55 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

had  done,  or  rather  begun  once,  he  said,  when  staying  with  him  in 
his  place  in  the  country.  There  had  been  only  two  sittings  and 
then  Whistler,  unable  to  stand  the  country  any  longer,  rushed 
back  to  London.  It  is  a  small  portrait — anticipating  the  Holloway, 
Hannay,  Kennedy,  Crockett  portraits.  A  label,  stating  that  it  is 
the  result  of  two  sittings,  with  the  date,  is  on  the  back,  and  the 
date  is  1 886.  Mr.  Lucas  was  therefore  almost  twenty  years 
younger,  but  it  was  still  like  him.  He  stands  facing  you,  in  a  loose 
blue-black  coat  and  trousers,  cane  in  hand,  against  a  brown  back 
ground,  charming  in  colour,  full  of  character.  Mr.  Lucas  said  it 
was  characteristic  that,  as  he  heard  afterwards,  Whistler  should 
be  much  concerned  about  it — asking  some  one  who  had  seen  it 
whether  it  was  really  beautiful,  really  his  best — he  did  not  want 
anything  that  was  not  to  remain. 

It  was  over  the  discoveries  in  this  collection  that  the  critics  of 
America  made  such  fools  of  themselves.  If  Whistler  had  no  use  for 
the  country,  he  delighted  in  little  country  towns  and  villages,  leav 
ing  in  oils  and  water-colours  and  prints  many  records  of  his  wander 
ings  through  them  in  France  and  Belgium,  Holland  and  England. 
Lannion,  Paimpol,  Pourville,  Domburg,  Lyme  Regis  are  names  that 
occur  to  one  at  once.  In  some,  if  he  carried  away  his  impression  of 
the  place,  he  left  an  impression  of  himself  hardly  less  strong.  One 
evening  during  the  war  Muirhead  Bone  had  dropped  in  to  see  us : — 

July  i8th,  Ipi6.  He  gave  an  amusing  account  of  how  Whistler  is 
remembered  at  Lyme  Regis,  where  Mr.  Bone  and  his  family  spent 
the  summer  of  1914.  When  he  took  his  house  he  asked  the  house 
agent  if  he  had  known  Whistler.  The  house  agent  said  he  had 
rented  Whistler  a  studio,  the  first  time  we  ever  heard  Whistler 
had  a  studio  there.  It  was  a  sort  of  big  house-painter's  shop  with 
plenty  of  light.  The  house  agent  was  also  a  coal  merchant,  and 
Whistler's  French  servant  used  to  come  and  buy  coal  by  the  pound, 
and  take  it  home,  which  astonished  the  house  agent  who  had  never 
seen  such  a  thing  done  before.  No  doubt  he  put  it  down  to  the 
queer  ways  of  the  foreigner.  After  this,  Muirhead  Bone  made  a 
Whistler  pilgrimage  through  the  town.  He  found  the  Blacksmith 
who  looked  like  the  lithograph  and  painting  and  who  is  as  hand- 
56  [1900 


THE  COMMENCEMENT  OF  THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

some  as  ever.  He  also  found  Little  Rose.  She  is  the  daughter  of 
the  grocer  he  dealt  with,  she  has  married  away  from  Lyme  Regis, 
but  she  came  in  once  while  he  was  in  the  shop,  big  and  buxom, 
with  very  red  cheeks. 

Friday,  June  22nd,  IQOO.  Whistler  called  in  the  morning  to  say 
he  would  dine  on  Sunday.  He  seemed  to  be  quite  hurt  that  J. 
would  stay  away  while  he  is  here,  and  he  was  sure  if  he  went  down 
to  join  J.  in  Norfolk,  illustrating  articles  on  the  Norfolk  Broads  for 
The  Century,  J.  would  at  once  be  moving  on  somewhere  else. 

Sunday,  June  24th.  Dinner:  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lungren,  Mrs.  Custer, 
Mrs.  Ohl,  and  Whistler — the  latter  in  great  form.  As  we  sat  down, 
Mrs.  Custer  said  something  about  the  annoyance  of  having  too 
many  friends — "Ah,"  he  said,  "you  should  do  as  I  did — get  rid 
of  them  all  at  the  start!"  Rome,  he  described  as  "a  bit  of  an  old 
ruin  along  side  of  a  brand-new  railway  station,  where  I  saw  Mrs. 
Potter  Palmer."  The  talk  was  chiefly  of  the  Boers.  He  had  a 
sympathetic  audience,  and  so  went  over  it  all  again  .  .  .  "Well, 
you  know,  Bismarck  said  South  Africa  would  prove  the  grave  of 
the  British  Empire,  and  that  the  day  will  come  when  the  blundering 
of  the  British  army  will  surprise  the  world.  And  there  was  a  kind 
of  a  professional  prophet  who  predicted  a  July  that  would  bring 
destruction  to  the  British,  and  I — well — for  my  part,  I  am  waiting 
to  see  what  this  July  of  1900  has  in  store  for  the  Island — What?" 
Then,  the  inexhaustible  subject  of  British  cleanliness — "Paris  is 
and  always  has  been  full  of  baths — you  can  see  them,  beautiful 
Louis  XV  and  Louis  XVI  baths  on  the  Seine.  In  London,  until  a 
few  years  ago,  there  was  none,  except  one  in  Argyll  Street,  to  which 
Britons  came  with  a  furtive  air,  afraid  of  being  caught.  And  the 
French,  having  the  habit  of  the  bath,  think  and  say  nothing  of  it; 
while  the  British — well — they're  so  astonished  now  they  have 
learned  to  bathe  they  can't  talk  of  anything  but  their  tub:  that 
is  the  difference." 

The  little  party  of  Sunday,  the  24th,  was  in  every  way  to  Whistler's 
fancy.  Mrs.  Custer  is  the  widow  of  General  Custer,  and  so  he  was 
1900]  57 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

sure  she  could  understand  the  situation  in  South  Africa.  Mrs. 
Lungren  was  her  niece,  young  and  pretty.  Lungren  is  Fernand 
Lungren,  the  artist,  who  was  an  influence  in  raising  American 
illustration  to  the  high  level  it  reached  in  the  Eighties  and  Nineties. 
Mrs.  Ohl,  wife  of  a  well-known  American  journalist,  is  from  Georgia 
and  Whistler  dearly  loved  a  Southerner.  Besides,  he  had  already 
met  her  in  Paris  where  she  had  an  apartment  for  a  year  or  two, 
and  a  young  friend,  another  Southerner,  who  shared  it  with 
her,  was  a  student  at  the  Academic  Carmen.  There  was  no 
jarring  element. 

Monday •,  June  25th.  Dined  at  the  Maurice  Macmillans,  and  while 
I  was  there  Whistler  called  at  Buckingham  Street. 

CHAPTER  VI:  CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL,  HIS 
FRIENDS  AND  HIS  ENEMIES.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Tuesday,  June  26th,  1900.  To  make  up  for  missing  Whistler  yester 
day,  asked  him  to  dine  with  me  alone.  He  came  about  a  quarter 
past  eight.  "You  know,  I  meant  to  send  an  answer  by  the  boy, 
but  somehow  the  boy  had  gone  before  I  knew  it,  and  then,  some 
how,  the  day  had  gone  before  I  knew  it,  and  there  was  nothing  to 
do  but  come  and  make  my  apologies."  He  brought  with  him  all 
the  choice  clippings  from  the  papers  of  the  two  last  days,  reporting 
the  news,  with  comments,  of  the  early  days  of  the  month,  which 
so  far  had  not  been  sent  in  detail.  .  .  .  These,  with  his  own  addi 
tional  comments,  he  was  preparing  to  send  to  Kennedy,  who 
ventures  to  sympathize  with  the  English  .  .  . 
But  the  talk  of  the  evening  was  on  Howell,  "the  wonderful  man, 
the  genius,  the  superb  liar,  the  Gil-Bias,  Robinson-Crusoe  hero  out 
of  his  proper  time,  the  creature  of  top-boots  and  plumes — splen 
didly  flamboyant.  Rossetti  made  a  famous  limerick  of  him: 

There's  a  Portuguee  person  called  Howell, 

Who  lays  on  his  lies  with  a  trowel. 

When  I  goggle  my  eyes 

And  start  with  surprise 

'Tis  at  the  monstrous  big  lies  told  by  Howell. 
58  [1900 


C.  A.  HOWELL 

PEN-AND-INK 

By  H.  T.  Dunn 
In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  W.  M.  Rossetti 


CHELSEA  EMBANKMENT 

OIL 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

He  was  the  real  hero  of  the  Picaresque  Novel,  forced  by  modern 
conditions  into  other  adventures  and  along  other  roads.  He  had 
the  instinct  for  beautiful  things.  He  knew  them  and  made  him 
self  indispensable  by  knowing  them.  He  was  of  the  greatest 
service  to  Rossetti;  he  helped  Watts  to  sell  his  pictures  and  raise 
his  prices;  he  acted  as  artistic  adviser  to  Mr.  Howard  [Lord  Car 
lisle].  He  had  the  gift  of  intimacy;  he  was  at  once  a  friend,  on 
closest  terms  of  confidence.  He  introduced  everybody  to  every 
body,  he  entangled  everybody  with  everybody,  and  it  was  easier 
to  get  involved  with  Howell  than  to  get  rid  of  him." 
Whistler  could  afford  to  remain  friendly  after  everyone  else  had 
withdrawn  because,  as  he  once  told  a  man  who  threatened  his 
private  life,  "'I  have  no  private  life!'  I  called  after  him  as  he 
growled  threats  down  the  stairs.  It  was  a  summer  I  was  living  in 
Chelsea,  in  Lindsey  Row,  in  the  house  next  to  where  Peter  Studd 
is  now,  and  my  mother  was  with  me.  There  always  was  real  sum 
mer  in  those  days — I  was  doing  the  nocturnes — and  life  was  won 
derful — if  I  rang,  always  a  boy  seemed  to  appear  with  a  bunch  of 
mint!  Well,  you  know,  it  happened  one  evening  I  was  sitting  look 
ing  out  of  my  window,  and  there  was  Howell  passing,  and  Rosa 
Corder  was  with  him.  And  I  called  out  to  them  and  they  came  in. 
It  was  astounding  with  Howell,  he  was  like  a  great  Portuguese 
cock  of  the  poultry  yard :  hens  were  always  clucking  about  him — 
his  wife  'Kitty,'  and  Miss  Alice  Chambers,  and  Rosa  Corder. 
Well  they  came  in  and  I  rang,  and  tea  and  ice  and  all  sorts  of  won 
derful  things  came  up — and  Howell  said,  'Why  you  have  etched 
many  plates,  haven't  you?  You  must  get  them  out,  you  must 
print  them,  you  must  let  me  see  to  them — there's  gold  waiting. 
And  you  have  the  press.'  And  so  I  had  in  a  room  upstairs,  only 
it  was  rusty,  it  hadn't  been  used  for  so  long.  But  Howell  wouldn't 
listen  to  an  objection.  He  said  he  would  fix  up  the  press,  he  would 
pull  it.  And  there  was  no  escape.  And  the  next  morning,  there 
we  all  were,  Rosa  Corder  too,  and  Howell  pulling  at  the  wheel, 
and  there  were  basins  of  water  and  paper  being  damped,  and 
prints  being  dried,  and  then  Howell  was  grinding  more  ink,  and 
with  the  plates  under  my  fingers,  I  felt  all  the  old  love  for  it  come 
1900]  59 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

back.  In  the  afternoons  Howell  would  go  and  see  Graves  the 
printsellers  in  Pail-Mall,  and  there  were  orders  flying  about,  and 
cheques — it  was  all  amazing,  you  know!  Howell  profited,  of 
course.  But  he  was  so  superb.  One  evening  we  left  a  pile  of  eleven 
prints  just  pulled,  and  the  next  morning  only  five  were  there. 
'It's  very  strange/  Howell  said,  'we  must  have  a  search.  No  one 
could  have  taken  them  but  me,  and  that  you  know  is  impossible!' 
And  then  Howell  said  I  must  paint  the  portrait  of  Rosa  Corder, 
and  there  would  be  engravings  and  he  would  arrange  with  the 
Graves,  and,  naturally  he  couldn't  pay  much  but  he  would  want 
the  picture  for  himself,  and  he  would  give  me  a  hundred  pounds. 
I  said  I  would  paint  it  for  him  and  the  engraving  would  pay  me. 
But  no,  Howell  said,  I  must  have  my  hundred  pounds — and  the 
work  began.  In  the  middle  of  it  he  suggested  a  portrait  of  Disraeli, 
and  the  Graves  agreed;  they  would  give  me  a  thousand  pounds 
for  picture  and  copyright,  and  it  would  be  a  companion  for  the 
Carlyle.  Howell  made  all  the  arrangements.  Then  came  the 
afternoon  at  Disraeli's  place  near  Beaconsfield — a  story  to  be  told 
another  time — when  everything  was  most  wonderful,  and  we  were 
the  two  artists  together,  recognizing  each  other  at  a  glance  just 
as  I  and  Augustine  know  and  understand  each  other.  When  I 
got  back  to  town  I  reported  to  Howell  at  Southampton  Row, 
where  Rosa  Corder  was  established.  At  supper,  Howell  was  in  a 
most  sentimental  mood — 'You  have  never  believed  me  in  all  this, 
you  have  never  had  the  least  confidence,  you  did  not  think  I  was 
going  to  pay  you,  but  here!'  and  he  threw  down  a  role  of  bank 
notes.  All  surprised,  I  found  seventy  of  the  hundred  pounds  and 
pocketed  them  bewildered. 

Next  came  the  Ruskin  trial,  and  general  collapse,  and  my  journey 
to  Venice.  When  I  got  back  to  town,  passing  by  the  Graves 
picture  shop  I  stopped  in  one  day.  The  old  man  was  glad  to  see 
me,  fact  of  the  matter  was  he  wanted  to  know  when  I  proposed 
to  pay  back  the  two  hundred  pounds?  'What  two  hundred 
pounds?'  I  asked.  Why,  the  money  he  advanced  at  Mr.  HowelPs 
request  on  the  Disraeli  portrait  that  was  never  painted.  He  gave 
it  the  day  I  went  down'  to  Beaconsfield! — the  seventy  pounds  were 
60  [1900 


ROSA  CORDER 

PEN   AND    WASH 
In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 


SELSEY  BILL 

WATER-COLOUR 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Knowles 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

explained.  Had  he  no  security?  I  asked.  Why,  yes,  there  was  the 
portrait  of  my  Mother — so  that,  after  all,  but  for  Howell,  the  por 
trait  would  have  gone  to  the  creditors!" 

And  then  there  were  the  stories  of  Howell's  house  in  Fulham,  full 
of  beautiful  things,  the  hens  all  there  clucking,  and  a  child — no  one 
knew  who  was  its  mother — and  an  old  Italian,  Brugiani,  a  Neapoli 
tan  who  had  had  a  fine  villa  and  things  in  it  near  Florence,  all  of 
which  passed  somewhere  through  the  fingers  of  Howell,  and  Bru 
giani,  by  way  of  claiming  interest,  had  settled  down  on  Howell, 
sleeping  much  under  an  old  fur  coat,  playing  checkers  with  "Kitty" 
and  going  to  some  unknown  business  every  morning.  And  then 
Howell's  days  spent  in  four  wheelers  full  of  all  sorts  of  things — he 
was  known  to  and  loved  by  all  the  pawnbrokers  of  London — and 
his  appearance  in  court  when  the  railway  ran  through  his  place 
and  he  claimed  damages — spending  the  day  before  the  inspectors 
came  pulling  up  the  weeds  in  the  carriage  drive  to  the  front  door, 
and  pleading  his  case  so  well  that  the  Judge  complimented  him 
and  awarded  him  heavy  damages,  Howell  afterwards  carrying  off 
the  mantel  pieces  and  the  lead  from  the  roof  and  putting  any  old 
rubbish  in  their  place.  This  was  followed  by  a  flight  to  the  sea 
shore,  to  Selsey  Bill,  and  his  establishment  in  three  houses  by  the 
sea,  and  his  swaggering  in  the  village  as  a  great  person,  and  on 
profitable  terms  for  himself  with  a  wine  merchant,  and  finding 
occupation  in  getting  off  the  copper  from  an  old  wreck  in  front  of 
his  houses,  there  for  years,  but  never  before  touched.  The  end 
was  the  Paddon  affair — Paddon,  a  diamond  merchant  who  en 
trusted  him  with  his  cheque  book  and  orders  generally  to  furnish 
and  decorate — probably  half  the  shops  of  the  kind  in  town  coming 
in  for  the  plunder  with  Howell.  But  the  end  was  the  famous  black 
pots — Chinese,  very  rare,  costing  thousands — and  then  Paddon 
discovered  rows  of  the  same  pots  in  an  Oxford  Street  shop — mere 
fakes.  And  that  was  the  end  of  Howell. 

Howell  disappeared  for  a  while,  but  not  so  long  after  was  seen  at 
the  house  of  a  Lady  Somebody  in  Mayfair,  and  is  supposed  to 
have  died  at  Rosa  Corder's  in  Southampton  Row.  He  is  said  to 
have  left  his  daughter  as  her  fortune  a  huge  box  of  letters  and 
1900]  6 1 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

papers  good  for  blackmail.  Whistler  never  broke  off  with  him 
really,  though  he  did  not  let  Howell  attend  to  things  in  the  end — 
but  went  with  him  and  stayed  at  Paddon's,  laughing  at  him  and 
his  adventures  to  his  face,  much  to  his  discomfiture.  There  was 
another  famous  adventure.  "Some  Mr.  Gerald  Lee  had  filled  his 
house  with  Old  Masters  bought  from  a  Jew  dealer,  and  died  before 
paying  for  them  all.  A  claim  was  brought  against  the  estate,  but 
Mrs.  Lee,  who  somehow  doubted  their  genuineness,  refused  to  pay. 
Howell,  posing  as  professional  expert  and  having  in  his  cleverness 
managed  to  get  a  government  position,  was  sent  down  to  report. 
He  made  out  a  most  wonderful  catalogue,  written  with  his  inevit 
able  neatness  and  elegance,  all  in  favour  of  Mrs.  Lee.  There  was, 
for  instance,  say  a  Sassoferato — which  he  described  eloquently  as 
a  picture  he  would  not  be  willing  to  see  in  the  house  with  him. 
But  to  everybody's  surprise  on  the  day  of  the  trial  he  turned  com 
pletely  round.  Fletcher  Moulton,  the  Jew's  Counsel,  had  despaired 
and  now  found  the  case  going  for  him — and  Howell  was  superb. 
When  he  was  asked  to  explain  what  he  meant  about  the  Sasso 
ferato  paragraph — there  was  no  hesitation.  Sassoferato  was  a 
painter  with  whom  he  had  absolutely  no  sympathy — he  was  too 
sincere  an  admirer  of  this  great  master  and  that  to  stoop  to  Sasso 
ferato.  But  it  only  showed  what  a  fine,  unquestionably  authentic 
Sassoferato  it  was  that  it  should  have  excited  him  to  so  strong  an 
expression  of  opinion.  And  again  he  was  complimented! 
"When  Rossetti  was  painting  Mrs.  William  Morris,  she  was  at 
work  embroidering  a  design  of  Rossetti's  on  some  hangings.  And 
there  she  sat,  day  after  day,  embroidering,  until,  at  last,  the  curtain 
was  finished  and  Howell — the  Owl,  as  they  called  him — hung  it 
up  between  Mrs.  Morris'  bed  and  Morris'.  But  it  was  too  short, 
about  a  foot  from  the  floor  and  Howell  came  to  tell  Rossetti. 
What  was  to  be  done?  It  was  a  foot  from  the  floor,  and  some  night 
Morris  would  crawl  under!  'He  would  not  dare!'  Rossetti  de 
clared,  bringing  his  fist  down  on  the  table  with  a  bang.  Rossetti," 
Whistler  added,  "was  a  prince  among  parasites." 
Burne-Jones  was  painting  and  drawing  and  sketching  one  of  the 
Greek  colony  and  there  were  dreadful  times.  But  Howell  managed 
62  [1900 


CHINESE  CABINET  SUBJECT  OF  THE  OWL  AND  THE   CABINET 

PHOTO 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
(See  pages  34  and  205) 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

to  bring  her  and  Mrs.  Burne- Jones  together,  and  they  were  friendly, 
and  all  was  pleasant.  But  the  first  time  'Ned'  saw  the  two 
together,  he  fainted,  and  in  falling  struck  his  forehead  against  the 
mantel.  'And,'  said  Howell,  with  his  last  convincing  touch — the 
touch  of  realism  only  he  could  have  invented — 'whenever  it's 
damp,  he  feels  it  here,'  pointing  to  his  temples. 

Whistler  this  evening  was  absorbed  in  Howell  and  Howell's  friends, 
and  so  perhaps,  before  going  further  we  had  better  explain  one 
casual  reference  and  say  that  Augustine,  whom  he  honoured  by 
bracketing  her  with  Disraeli,  was  for  twenty  years  our  housekeeper, 
cook,  and  general  guardian.  She  is  the  only  person  we  know  who 
was  not  afraid  to  scold  Whistler  when  he  was  late  for  dinner  or 
whenever  it  seemed  to  her  he  deserved  it.  And  Whistler  never 
resented  her  scolding.  He  thought  her  as  a  cook  an  artist,  as  a 
Frenchwoman  he  understood  her.  There  was  always  a  little  talk 
with  her  in  the  hall  before  he  was  ushered  in  to  us. 
Howell  needs  no  explanation — Charles  Augustus  Howell  who 
figures  in  the  letters,  and  affairs  of  Swinburne,  Rossetti,  Ruskin, 
Burne- Jones,  as  well  as  of  Whistler,  who  has  been  much  written 
about  of  recent  years  in  the  general  raking-up  of  Pre-Raphaelite 
gossip,  most  recently  of  all  by  Dr.  G.  C.  Williamson  who  devotes 
a  long  chapter  to  his  adventures  in  Murray  Marks  and  His  Friends. 
Howell  is  said  to  have  penetrated  even  into  the  Bishop  of  London's 
palace  at  Fulham  to  improve  the  Bishop's  taste  in  furniture  and 
things,  and  there,  on  the  Episcopal  grounds,  to  have  introduced 
Menpes  to  Whistler — which  is,  at  least,  an  amazing  tale.  Even 
Whistler  did  not  exhaust  the  inexhaustible  stories  told  of  him.  One 
we  remember  is  of  complications  as  to  the  ownership  of  forty  blue 
pots  and  a  demand  from  the  courts  that  they  should  be  produced. 
Howell  arrived,  leading  a  procession  of  forty  four-wheelers,  each 
containing  one  of  the  precious  pots,  and  he  won  his  case  and  was 
complimented  as  usual  by  the  judge,  given  back  the  pots,  and 
awarded  damages,  including  the  cost  of  the  four-wheelers.  Howell 
was  proud  of  his  success  in  court.  After  the  Ruskin  trial,  he  said 
he  thought  he  could  really  have  won  the  case  had  he  been  sub 
poenaed  as  witness.  "  Yes,"  said  Whistler,  "  had  j  ou  been  a  witness 
you  would  have  won  and  we  would  all  have  been  in  Newgate!" 
Another  story  we  had  from  Robert  Ross: 

October  22nd,  1906.  Whistler,  one  day  when  the  talk  was  of  the 
Oratory  and  what  it  ought  to  be,  made  a  sketch  of  his  idea  for  it. 
1900]  63 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

The  sketch  was  thrown  aside  and  thought  of  no  more.  Then  a 
fearfully  hard-up  moment  came  for  all  the  group,  no  money  to  be 
had  anywhere.  Howell  said  he  would  see  what  he  could  do,  the 
sketch  suddenly  reappeared,  he  carried  it  to  Attenborough,  the 
pawn-broker,  returning  with  more  money  than  any  of  them  had 
ever  yet  pawned  their  work  for.  Time  went  on,  the  sketch  was 
not  redeemed,  was  altogether  forgotten,  until  Whistler,  passing 
Attenborough's,  discovered  it  in  the  window,  described  as  Michael 
Angelo's  first  drawing  for  St.  Peter's,  with  a  huge  price  tagged  on 
to  it.  Howell's  success  was  explained. 

Of  what  time  will  do  for  a  story,  we  had  an  amusing  example  when 
this  one  returned  to  us,  Robert  Ross  quoted  as  authority,  though 
the  drawing  had  become  one  of  the  Louvre  by  Whistler  which  Jo 
tried  to  sell  to  Sir  Sidney  Colvin  for  the  British  Museum  as  a 
sketch  of  the  Parthenon  by  Michael  Angelo. 

Whistler  always  spoke  of  Howell  in  a  kindly  way,  despite  his 
games,  for  Whistler  loved  the  fantastic,  the  picturesque  in  people, 
and  he  found  Howell  vastly  diverting.  "I  think  that,  criminally 
speaking,  the  Portuguee  is  an  artist,"  is  the  opinion  he  published 
in  The  Paddon  Papers,  and,  as  this  pamphlet  is  little  known  and 
is  so  rare  that  it  is  not  likely  to  be  better  known,  we  quote  from  it 
another  of  his  reasons  for  gratitude.  Howell,  he  said,  was  the 
inspiration  of  "one  of  my  most  brilliant  things — at  least  I  am  told 
so."  Mitford  [Lord  Redesdale]  rebuked  Whistler  for  going  about 
recklessly  with  Howell,  for  being  seen  walking  down  Bond  Street 
with  him:  "My  dear  Whistler,  even  you  cannot  brave  the  people 
longer.  Howell,  you  know,  is  a  robber."  "Well,  my  dear  Mitford," 
Whistler  said,  "so  was  Barabbas!" 

In  a  package  of  letters,  out  of  the  same  shop  from  which  so  many 
sensational  discoveries  and  unknown  masterpieces  emerged  a  few 
years  ago,  were  testimonials  to  Howell's  talents  and  ability  signed 
by  Rossetti,  Millais,  Whistler,  and  others  of  the  group,  and 
Whistler's  we  have  seen.  In  it  he  testified  to  Howell's  qualifica 
tions  as  a  man  of  business  and  his  practical  knowledge  of  art.  This 
was  dated  1872,  but  Howell  was  of  most  use  to  Whistler  during  the 
difficulties  that  ended  in  the  bankruptcy,  taking  debts  upon  his  own 
shoulders,  signing  notes,  accepting  responsibilities.  We  suspected 
that  his  success  in  his  railway  case,  though  Whistler  seemed  to  credit 
it — "gained  with  thousands,"  he  wrote  to  Lazenby  Liberty — was 
part  of  Howell's  flamboyant  invention, until  the  bankruptcy  papers 
64  [1900 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

came  into  our  possession.  It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  they  show 
Howell  in  a  more  favourable  light  than  that  in  which  he  is 
usually  seen.  He  was  deep  in  difficulties  of  his  own — "It's  all  the 
devil  as  I  am  worried  to  death,"  he  wrote  to  Anderson  Rose, 
Whistler's  solicitor.  He  had  to  leave  his  Fulham  house,  with 
nowhere  to  go,  and  one  shilling  to  every  ten  everybody  required, 
"still  I  am  most  anxious  to  see  Jimmie  out  of  the  mess  and  will 
do  all  I  can."  One  thing  he  did  do  is  in  another  letter  to  Rose — 
he  met  a  bill  given  to  the  irrepressible  Mr.  Nightingale,  builder  of 
the  White  House  and  one  of  Whistler's  most  importunate  creditors 
"with  the  money  out  of  my  railway  verdict  now  about  to  be  paid." 
One  of  the  humours  of  the  bankruptcy,  we  might  add,  is  Night 
ingale's  entreaty  to  Anderson  Rose,  through  his  own  solicitor,  to 
be  informed  what  this  Mr.  Charles  Augustus  Howell  was,  anyhow, 
which  most  people  who  had  anything  to  do  with  Howell  were  apt 
to  want  to  know.  But  despite  an  occasional  flash  of  humour,  the 
correspondence,  which  came  into  our  hands  after  the  sixth  edition 
of  the  Life  had  gone  to  press,  is  so  tragic  that  it  has  made  us 
wonder  more  than  ever  how  Whistler  survived  the  anxiety  and 
endless  interruptions  of  writs  and  bailiffs  and  complicated  bank 
ruptcy  proceedings. 

Of  course  Howell  was  not  wholly  disinterested.  His  trouble  was 
not  without  its  reward.  He  made  money  by  pawning  some  of 
Whistler's  pictures,  by  selling  others.  There  were  times  when 
Whistler,  hard  up,  sold  them  to  him  for  a  song,  times  when  they 
came  into  his  possession  by  accident.  Once  when  Mr.  Croal 
Thomson  asked  Whistler  to  sign  a  painting  of  Selsey  Bill  Sands, 
Whistler  refused — he  painted  it  when  Nature  was  in  a  shocking 
state — it  was  a  scrap  he  left  at  Howell's  who  ought  to  have  thrown 
it  in  the  fire  instead  of  keeping  it.  This  was  when  he  was  staying 
with  Howell  at  Selsey  Bill  where  we  know  he  made  an  etching  and 
at  least  one  water-colour.  Howell  must  also  have  been  repaid  by 
Josey's  three  mezzotint  reproductions,  for  the  circulars  are  in  his 
name  and  his  Fulham  house  is  the  address  given  to  subscribers. 
The  etchings  acquired  in  one  way  or  another,  were  a  further  source 
of  profit.  One  firm  of  dealers  told  us  of  plates  he  sold  them  when 
Whistler  was  in  Venice  and  of  the  "terrible  row"  when  Whistler 
was  written  to.  At  the  press  view  of  the  Menpes  collection,  in 
the  Leicester  Galleries,  1903,  Ernest  G.  Brown  said  to  E.  that  the 
collection  was  mainly  Howell's,  yet  no  one  knew  how.  Howell 
realized  its  value  even  in  days  when  the  prints  sold  for  little. 
Brown  wished  to  buy  some  of  them,  but  Howell  said  no;  only 
when  the  United  States  Government  was  willing  to  pay  three 

1900]  65 

S 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

thousand  pounds  for  the  entire  collection,  would  he  part  with  them. 
It  might  be  well  to  recall  that  in  England,  in  1920,  at  Christie's, 
The  Second  Venice  Set  alone  sold  for  over  three  thousand  pounds. 
Howell,  in  Menpes'  debt,  left  the  prints  with  Menpes  as  security, 
he  died  while  they  were  still  there,  Menpes  kept  them  in  settlement 
of  the  debt,  and  Brown  thought  Menpes  would  make  five  or  six 
thousand  pounds — they  were  selling  for  enormous  prices — the 
Mother  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  pounds.  Before  the  exhibition 
closed,  in  another  moment  of  confidence,  Brown  said  he  had  made 
about  ten  thousand  pounds  for  Menpes,  so  that  had  the  United 
States  Government  bought  at  Howell's  price,  it  would  not  have 
made  so  bad  a  bargain. 

Among  the  Menpes  prints  were  a  few  lithographs,  probably  only 
part  of  Howell's  collection,  according  to  T.  R.  Way: — 

September  2$th,  1906.  Howell  used  to  come  to  Wellington  Street 
with  Whistler  almost  always  for  a  while  and,  watching  the  proofs 
come  off  the  press,  would  say,  "This  is  for  me,  Whistler,  and  this, 
and  this — "  and  Whistler  never  objected.  And  Way  seemed  to 
think  it  was  not  much  in  return  for  all  Howell  did  for  Whistler. 
The  Ways  stood  around  also,  and  Howell  advised  them  to  keep 
proofs  of  the  lithographs.  "See  that  you  keep  them  all,  Tom, 
and  some  day  you  will  be  glad  enough."  And  Tom  did,  he  thought 
his  must  be  the  only  complete  set,  but  it  probably  was  not  complete. 
He  had  not  the  French  ones,  though  these  Whistler  was  decent 
enough  to  try  and  get  for  him  in  Paris.  His  father  too  kept  proofs 
and  gave  those  he  had  to  the  British  Museum.  Others  of  the 
family  and  employes  had  numbers  of  them.  And  prints  were 
always  turning  up  in  the  shop.  Whistler's  letters  were  turned 
into  money  by  Howell.  Way  assured  us  that  not  only  his  father 
was  interested  in  Whistler,  but  also  his  father-in-law,  a  Mr.  Cox, 
a  stock-broker.  Howell  had  a  wonderful  collection  of  letters  from 
the  various  artists  with  whom  he  was  intimately  associated,  and 
almost  all  of  these,  except  Whistler's,  passed  into  the  hands  of 
Fairfax  Murray.  Whistler's  did  not,  for  this  reason — Way's 
father-in-law  found  in  an  old  second-hand  shop  two  albums  full 
of  Whistler's  letters  to  Howell,  carefully  arranged  and  pasted 
in,  a  few  sketches  and  other  things  with  them,  even  dishonored 
66  [1900 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

cheques  and  letters  written  as  a  child  to  his  Mother.  Mr.  Cox 
said  this  would  never  do.  Such  things  should  not  be  wandering 
about.  He  bought  the  two  volumes  for  fourteen  pounds,  and  wrote 
and  told  Whistler,  who  immediately  asked  him  to  bring  them  to  the 
studio,  just  as  they  were,  that  together  they  might  choose  sketches 
or  destroy  letters.  Mr.  Cox  removed  some  of  the  sketches  before 
going,  but  gave  him  the  books,  and  was  given  etchings  for  them. 
One  paper  showed  that  Leyland  was  paid  after  the  bankruptcy 
five  shillings  in  the  pound  and  Mr.  Cox  thought  Whistler  would 
not  care  to  have  that  seen.  But  Whistler  said,  on  the  contrary,  it 
showed  that  the  creditors  were  paid!  These  documents,  therefore, 
unless  they  were  destroyed,  must  be  in  Miss  Philip's  possession. 
Another  thing  Mr.  Cox  found  in  the  pawn  shop,  bought,  and  told 
Whistler  about,  was  the  Gold  Medal  awarded  to  Whistler  in 
Amsterdam.  Walter  Sickert  was  in  the  studio  and  Whistler  turned 
to  him  and  asked  why  he  had  neglected  to  pay  the  interest,  or 
whatever  it  is  called.  And  Sickert  shrugged  his  shoulders  as  only 
answer,  for  how  could  he? — there  was  no  money.  The  Medal 
went  into  Mr.  Morrison's  collection. 

We  asked  Miss  Chambers,  mentioned  by  Whistler  in  the  same 
evening's  talk,  an  artist,  one  of  Howell's  executors,  if  she  knew 
anything  of  this  album  and  the  documents  in  it.  "Howell,"  was  her 
answer,  "sometimes  borrowed  money  upon  letters  and  other  manu 
scripts  from  a  bookseller  called  Coalford,  whose  shop  disappeared 
some  years  ago  from  the  Strand,  a  little  west  of  Drury  Lane."  She 
could  not  say  if  any  of  Whistler's  letters  were  among  them.  But 
the  fact  that  Howell  at  times  pawned  letters  helps  to  explain  how 
Whistler's  got  into  the  pawnshop,  especially  as  some  of  them 
were  to  Howell. 

Altogether,  after  everything  that  can  be  has  been  said  for  Howell, 
he  does  not  strike  us  as  blameless  in  his  relations  with  Whistler 
and  probably  nobody  was  more  conscious  of  it  than  himself. 
Another  of  Ernest  G.  Brown's  recollections  was  of  Howell's  dis 
comfort  in  Whistler's  presence  after  the  Paddon  affair.  He  took 
Howell  to  have  a  drink  at  a  bar  near  the  Gallery,  where  Howell 
confessed  his  fear  of  Whistler,  saying  he  would  be  sure  to  show  it 
if  they  met.  As  he  spoke,  his  face  turned  white,  and  Brown  heard 
a  loud  "Ha!  ha!"  and  saw  Whistler  coming  in  at  the  door. 
1900]  67 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Howell  had  a -few  friends  who  never  ceased  to  believe  in  him.  Miss 
Chambers  never  wavered  in  her  admiration  and  confidence.  When 
we  were  preparing  the  Life  and  she  consulted  his  diary  for  us,  she 
spoke  of  him  with  enthusiasm  and  swept  aside  every  charge  against 
him.  It  is  in  HowelPs  favour  that  whatever  his  rogueries,  he  was 
a  pleasant  rogue  capable  of  inspiring  in  some  people  a  confidence 
unshaken  by  his  shadiest  transaction.  E.  can  quote  another  of  his 
enthusiastic  admirers: — 

February  8th,  1907.  Calling  on  Mrs.  [afterwards  Lady]  Donkin, 
met  there  Mrs.  Jenner,  who  said  she  had  just  been  to  the  Old 
Masters  Show  at  the  Royal  Academy  with  her  oldest  friend,  Miss 
Chambers,  and  Miss  Chambers  had  been  talking  to  her  about  our 
Life  of  Whistler.  This  led  her  to  speak  of  Howell  whom  she  and 
her  husband  knew  well,  liked  and  believed  in.  He  was  the  soul  of 
honour,  generosity  itself,  the  most  amusing  of  men.  Because  of 
some  entanglement  with  a  woman — he  swore  never  to  tell  the  story 
— he  got  into  all  his  troubles.  It  was  the  reason  of  his  misunder 
standing  with  Ruskin.  Honour  forbade  him  to  tell  the  story  and 
he  left  Ruskin  with  his  honesty  in  question.  A  bad  name  sticks 
to  a  man  and  so  he  got  the  reputation  for  dishonesty,  until  in  the 
end  he  might,  possibly  with  business  men,  have  not  been,  strictly 
speaking,  straight  in  his  transactions.  But  he  always  was  with 
artists  and  his  friends.  There  were  tales  of  him  in  connection  with 
a  society  and  its  funds,  and  he  was  examined  by  a  doctor,  a  barris 
ter,  and  a  parson,  and  came  out  "without  a  stain  on  his  character." 
Though  he  wouldn't  give  the  facts  of  his  entanglement  to  Ruskin 
to  clear  himself,  he  confided  them  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Jenner,  who 
cannot  break  confidence.  No  doubt,  when  he  told  a  story,  he  had 
some  sense  of  artistic  finish,  but  that  was  why  he  was  delightful. 
Anyway,  while  Whistler  was  treating  him  shockingly,  Howell  was 
keeping  Whistler's  illegitimate  son  from  starvation — Howell's 
version  this.  He  may,  in  Whistler's  penniless  moments,  have 
advanced  money  to  pay  for  the  son  whom  we  know  Whistler  looked 
out  for  as  a  child  and  launched  in  life. 

The  talk  with  Miss  Chambers  was  of  such  interest  that  we  give  it 
as  it  is  in  E's.  note  of  the  time,  simply  omitting  facts  and  details 
used  elsewhere: 
68  [1900 


CHARLES  AUGUSTUS  HOWELL 

January  I2th,  1907.  Went  to  see  Miss  Chambers,  Howell's  execu 
trix.  I  found  her  a  woman  of  about  fifty,  stout,  pleasantly  ugly, 
with  no  endeavor  to  dress  so  as  to  improve  matters.  She  seemed  a 
trifle  nervous  at  first,  or  I  may  have  imagined  it.  She  showed  me 
loose  pages  of  an  account  of  money  received  by  Whistler  and 
Maud  and,  in  one  or  two  cases,  "Mrs.  Abbott,"  from  Howell  .  .  . 
and  a  diary  ...  It  is  clear  from  the  diary  that  in  the  late  summer 
and  autumn  of  1877  Howell  was  again  printing  with  Whistler.  He 
was  constantly  going  and  coming  with  prints  .  .  .  On  February  22, 
1878,  Howell  bought  from  Whistler  for  fifty  pounds  a  large 
picture  of  apple  blossoms,  a  sketch  for  Miss  Alexander,  one  for  a 
portrait  of  Greaves,  a  Nocturne — winter  scene  in  Chelsea — a  small 
framed  Nocturne,  Battersea — and  eight  frames.  The  journal 
gives  an  idea  of  Whistler  living  from  hand  to  mouth,  in  a  generally 
impecunious  condition,  from  about  the  time  of  the  quarrel  with 
Leyland  until  the  bankruptcy  and  the  journey  to  Venice.  Entries 
show  Howell  borrowing  twenty  shillings  from  "Alice,"  [Miss 
Chambers],  to  lend  immediately  fifteen  to  Whistler,  or  Whistler 
borrowing  from  Howell,  who,  to  lend,  had  to  borrow  from  Anderson 
Rose,  who,  in  turn,  had  to  borrow  from  his  head  clerk.  Things 
were  pawned — sometimes  there  are  comments,  as  "lent  ten  pounds 
to  Whistler,  eight  pounds  to  Maud,  good  girl  Maud."  On  another 
occasion,  he  took  twenty  shillings  out  of  his  pocket  to  give  Whistler, 
a  half  crown  came  with  it,  and  Whistler  said  he  might  as  well 
have  that  too.  Howell  finishes,  "I  walked  home,  damn  him." 
Another  time  after  an  affair  of  the  same  kind,  "selfish  fellow 
Whistler," — and  again,  he  took  gold  out  of  his  pocket,  and  "My 
God!"  Whistler  said.  Miss  Chambers  regrets  Howell's  want  of 
capital — had  he  only  had  capital,  he  might  have  done  anything  .  .  . 
.  .  .  Among  the  pictures  Howell  had  was  one  of  Whistler  in  the 
studio,  and  it  was  left  with  eight  or  nine  drawings,  as  security 
with  a  lawyer.  While  it  was  there,  stuck  up  against  the  wall  in 
the  office,  Whistler  came  in;  "Why,"  he  said,  "there's  the  portrait 
I  did  of  myself."  After  Howell's  death  the  picture,  with  the  draw 
ings,  came  to  Miss  Chambers.  Two  years  before  Whistler  died, 
she  took  it  to  Robinson  and  Fisher's  to  be  sold,  and  the  drawings 
1900]  69 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

too,  putting  a  reserve  price  on  them.  In  the  middle  of  the  sale, 
Whistler  came  in,  declared  the  picture  and  the  drawings  were  riot 
by  him,  and  the  result  was  they  did  not  sell.  After  Whistler's 
death  the  lawyer  made  a  statutory  declaration  that  Whistler  said 
the  picture  was  his  work,  it  was  sent  again  to  Robinson  and 
Fisher's  and  was  sold  for  a  comparatively  small  sum.  [This  is  the 
story  of  the  Dublin  In  the  Studio  that  Sir  Hugh  Lane  vowed  was 
the  original.  And  this  is  the  first  time  the  story  has  been  told. 
The  picture,  owned  by  Douglas  Freshfield  and  now  in  Chicago, 
is  the  original.]  The  drawings  Miss  Chambers  left  with  the  auc 
tioneers  for  a  few  days  after  that  first  attempt,  and  when  she  went 
to  get  them,  two  or  three  had  disappeared.  She  had  also  owned 
"The  Pacific."  When  it  was  sold  at  auction,  Whistler  bought  it. 
She  saw  a  good  deal  of  Whistler  in  those  old  days.  He  was  con 
stantly  at  Howell's.  She  never  felt  his  charm  particularly,  he 
seemed  to  her  tiresomely  selfish  and  vain,  but  she  always  thought 
him  what  he  called  Howell,  "an  amusing  cuss." 

Everybody  knows  Rosa  Corder  so  well  in  Whistler's  portrait  as 
to  forget  she  existed  out  of  it.  She  was  an  artist,  studied  with 
Felix  Moscheles,  devoted  herself  chiefly  to  painting  race  horses, 
and  is  said  to  have  aided  Howell  in  copying  old  paintings  and  draw 
ings.  We  remember  seeing  an  excellent  copy  by  her  of  Millais' 
Vale  of  Rest  hanging  in  Mrs.  Warr's  drawing-room  in  Earl's  Terrace, 
London.  But  her  claim  to  fame  rests  upon  the  fact  that  she  posed 
to  Whistler  for  one  of  his  most  beautiful  portraits. 

CHAPTER  VII:  EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES.  THE  YEAR 
NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Sunday,  July  ist,  IQOO.  Whistler  called  in  the  morning  to  see  J. 
who  got  back  on  Friday,  unexpectedly.  In  good  form  and  eager 
to  look  at  the  drawings  which  J.  refused  to  show.  Uncertain 
whether  he  could  come  and  dine  in  the  evening  or  not,  with  the 
result  that  we  got  back  from  the  Muras,  where  we  had  gone  for 
the  afternoon  and  were  expected  to  stay  to  supper — as  soon  as 
possible.  But  about  eight,  came  a  note  from  O'K.  saying  he  was 
too  tired,  but  might  come  later.  Toward  ten  both  appeared, 
70  [1900 


DESIGNS  FOR  BLUE  AND  WHITE  CHINA 

WASH 

The  Murray  Marks  Collection 
(See  Appendix  I,  page  302) 


DRAWING  FOR  SIR  HENRY  THOMPSON'S  CATALOGUE 

OF  A   COLLECTION   OF  BLUE  AND  WHITE   NANKIN 

PORCELAIN 

WASH 

In  the  possession  of  Pickford  R.  Waller,  Esq. 
(See  page  306) 


COVER  OF  THE  UNIQUE  LARGE  PAPER 

COPY  OF  THE  BOOK  IN  THE  PENNELL 

COLLECTION 

Library  of  Congress,  Washington 
(See  Appendix  I,  page  306) 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

Herbert  Gilchrist,  who  had  been  at  the  school  in  Paris,  having 
called  in  the  meanwhile.  This  was,  evidently,  an  element  Whistler 
found  antagonistic,  and  he  slept  part  of  the  time,  and  said  little 
the  rest. 

THE  Muras  are  Mr.  Frank  Mura,  the  distinguished  American 
painter,  and  his  wife  who  died  a  few  years  since.  They  were  then 
living  in  Greenwich.  We  remember  their  disappointment  for  they 
counted  on  our  staying.  Our  hurrying  back  shows  how  unwilling 
we  were  to  miss  any  chance  of  the  usual  talk  with  Whistler — no 
talk  at  all  this  evening,  as  it  turned  out. 

Herbert  Gilchrist  was  the  son  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Alexander  Gilchrist, 
authors  of  the  Life  of  Blake.  He  was  rather  old  for  a  student  when 
he  went  to  the  Academic  Carmen,  several  years  having  passed 
since  he  studied  in  the  Royal  Academy  Schools.  He  also  studied 
with  Chase  in  America,  where  he  went  with  his  mother  on  her 
extraordinary  journey  to  offer  herself  in  marriage  to  Walt  Whit 
man,  only  to  be  refused  and  to  remain  his  friend.  Gilchrist 
objected  to  the  methods  of  the  Academic  Carmen,  his  manner  had 
all  the  English  pomposity  carried  to  an  extreme,  and  it  is  easy  to 
understand  why  Whistler  was  little  in  sympathy  with  him. 

Wednesday,  July  4th.  Wrote  and  asked  Whistler  and  O'K.  to  dinner 
to  celebrate  J's.  birthday  and  the  Glorious  Fourth.  But,  as  J. 
was  obliged  to  go  to  a  meeting  of  the  Society  of  Illustrators  at 
half  past  eight,  must  ask  them  for  seven.  They  came,  but,  of 
course,  not  at  seven.  Whistler  was  full  chiefly  of  The  Architectural 
Review  which  has  not  yet  paid  him  and  of  a  fine  letter  he  wrote  to 
Wilson.  Could  it  be  the  same  Mr.  Wilson  who  was  on  the  Com 
mittee  of  the  International?  Hardly  possible!  Indignant  with  J. 
who,  even  on  an  occasion  of  this  kind,  with  Madame  everything 
that  was  charming,  would  not  make  himself  beautiful. 
J.  left  to  his  great  indignation,  and  later,  John  Lambert  came  in. 
Delighted  with  Lambert's  story  of  Carolus.  The  Jury  at  the  Paris 
Exposition  decided  that  the  First  Medals  for  Painting  should  not 
be  announced  until  all  the  other  Medals  were  awarded.  But 
somehow,  some  leaked  out,  and  the  names  got  into  the  papers. 
Carolus,  who  had  been  coming  to  the  meetings  in  gorgeous  clothes, 
appeared  one  morning  just  after  this  resplendent  in  a  flowered 
1900]  71 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

waistcoat.  When  the  Jury  met,  he  took  the  chair,  and  with  his 
eye  on  the  American  jurors  said  there  had  been  indiscretions  among 
some  of  the  members.  Harrison  was  up  like  a  shot:  "Apropos 
des  indiscretions,  Messieurs,  regardez  le  gilet  de  Carolus!"  Whistler 
was  delighted,  but  had  not  known  Harrison  was  so  equal  to 
an  occasion. 

O'K.  said  something  about  Millet,  whose  early  work  was  good, 
but  he  married  a  wife  and  had  to  manage  to  make  both  ends  meet. 
Whistler  was  indignant.  "The  artist's  work  is  never  better,  never 
worse,  it  must  be  always  good,  in  the  end  as  in  the  beginning,  if 
it  is  in  him  to  do  anything  at  all,  and  he  would  not  be  influenced 
by  the  chance  of  a  wife  or  anything  of  that  kind." 
It  was  not  one  of  his  brilliant  evenings.  Lambert,  evidently 
prepared  to  worship,  was  a  trifle  ponderous  and  serious,  with 
depressing  effect,  and  the  party  broke  up  early. 

Whistler's  habit  was  to  dress  for  dinner.  We  can  recall  but  few 
instances  when  he  was  willing  to  come  to  us,  informal  though  we 
were,  straight  from  the  studio  or  wherever  he  might  happen  to  be: 
one  reason  he  was  always  late.  We  were  less  formal  and  he  resented 
it,  or  pretended  to,  especially  when  the  occasion  for  a  dinner,  as 
on  the  Fourth  of  July,  which  is  also  J's.  patriotic  birthday,  sug 
gested  formality. 

The  Architectural  Review,  started  shortly  before,  was  a  monthly 
founded  by  a  Mr.  Abram  whose  ambitions  were  great.  He  wanted 
to  publish  only  the  best,  or  he  would  not  have  wanted  Whistler, 
whose  fine  lithograph  of  St.  Anne's,  Soho  appeared  in  his  Review. 
At  times  its  finances  did  not  keep  pace  with  his  ambitions,  and 
payment  was  not  always  prompt,  and  promptness  was  a  condi 
tion  upon  which  Whistler  insisted.  Harry  Wilson  was  then 
editor  of  The  Architectural  Review  and  a  member  of  the  Council 
of  the  International. 

John  Lambert  was  a  Philadelphia  artist  of  promise  who  died  too 
young  to  have  made  a  name  outside  of  Philadelphia.  We  need 
hardly  say  that  the  Carolus  of  his  story  was  Carolus  Duran,  and 
the  Harrison,  Alexander  Harrison.  If  Lambert  was  ponderous, 
we  have  been  told  since  by  one  of  his  friends,  it  was  because  he 
worshipped  in  fear  and  trembling.  He  was  overcome  by  meeting 
the  man  who  to  him  was  supreme  among  modern  artists.  He 
turned  white  and  half  the  time  had  not  a  word  to  say. 
72  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

Nothing  could  be  more  characteristic  than  Whistler's  answer  to 
Mr.  Kennedy  about  Millet.  His  theory,  his  belief,  his  ardent 
conviction,  was  that  the  quality  of  an  artist's  work  could  not 
change.  There  might  be  degrees  in  this  quality,  but  the  quality 
itself  must  be  always  there  from  his  first  painting  or  print  to  his 
last.  He  was  quick  to  pounce  upon  friend  or  enemy  who  ventured 
to  hold  or  suggest  the  opposite  opinion,  and  the  subject  roused 
him  often  to  eloquence,  often  to  wrath.  We  have  not  forgotten 
his  indignation  when  he  asked  J.  to  go  and  look  at  his  Carmen  at 
the  exhibition  of  the  Portrait  Painters'  Society  in  1895,  and  J., 
in  his  enthusiasm,  declared  he  had  never  seen  anything  like  it. 
What  did  he  mean  ?  Whistler  wanted  to  know.  The  Miss  Alexander 
was  like  it,  so  was  the  Nocturne  J.  was  reproducing  for  A  London 
Garland,  so  was  the  Mother  at  the  Luxembourg.  People  might  be 
a  long  time  in  finding  it  out,  but  all  his  paintings  were  alike — only, 
the  Carmen  was  finer.  This  was  one  of  the  times  when  he  said  he 
was  "mortally  offended,"  but  was  as  prompt  to  make  his  peace 
with  J.  as  to  take  offence.  Lavery  offended  no  less  once  when, 
talking,  of  V Art  Nouveau,  the  precursor  of  the  Isms  and  Ists,  he 
ventured  to  define  it.  Whistler  would  hear  of  no  definition — "There 
is — there  can  be — no  Art  Nouveau — there  is  only  Art!" 

Thursday,  July  $th.  To  Mrs.  Ohl's  to  dinner.  No  one  else  there 
but  Whistler,  who  was  fairly  prompt.  A  grey  evening,  the  sky 
heavy  as  lead,  no  air  anywhere,  a  suggestion  of  thunder,  and  we 
were  all  exhausted.  Whistler  fell  back  on  the  papers,  eager  about 
the  Chinese  business,  rejoicing  in  the  turn  affairs  were  taking. 
As  for  the  report  of  the  massacre  of  the  Ministers  in  Pekin  "Well, 
it  is  the  Chinese  way  of  doing  things  and  there  is  nothing  to  redress. 
Better  to  lose  whole  armies  of  Europeans  than  harm  one  blue  pot!" 
J.  told  of  Zug's  performance  as  instructor  of  art  in  Paris,  a  sort  of 
Cook  to  conduct  personally  parties  through  the  Grand  Palais  des 
Beaux-Arts,  and  his  request  that  J.  would  allow  his  name  to  be 
used  on  the  circular.  "When  a  man  writes  and  tells  me  that  my 
name  will  be  useful  to  him,"  Whistler  said,  "why  then  I  write  and 
say  it's  time  for  me  to  change  it!" 

Zug  is  Mr.  George  B.  Zug  who  has  now  become  a  great  Professor 

of  Art  in  a  small  college  in  the  United  States. 

1900]  73 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Sunday,  July  8th.  Dined  with  Kennedy  and  Whistler  at  Garlant's. 
Whistler  late  and  when  he  came  in,  it  was  clear  something  was 
wrong.  He  seemed  suddenly  to  have  grown  old.  His  hair  lay 
flat,  his  forehead  was  a  network  of  wrinkles,  his  cheeks  had  fallen 
and  were  flabby  and  pale,  and  when  he  talked,  all  life  and  gaiety 
and  fun  had  gone.  He  was  interested  when  we  told  him  of  the 
United  States  officer — Captain  Hunter — fresh  from  West  Point, 
who  had  called  on  us  in  the  afternoon.  West  Point  was  the  stand 
ard.  But  it  was  like  the  shadow  of  his  talk.  The  one  rally  was 
when  he  talked  of  Fagan,  whom  he  had  not  seen  for  a  long  while. 
There  was  some  little  discussion  as  to  who  Fagan  was — a  Jew? 
No,  because  his  father,  of  course,  was  Panizzi  of  the  British 
Museum — or  rather  his  uncle.  Whistler's  Secretary  Grimaldi,  he 
said,  had  been  to  the  British  Museum  to  see  to  something  for  him 
and  had  difficulty  about  getting  his  ticket.  He  should  have  got 
it  without  asking,  Grimaldi  said,  was  he  not  the  nephew  of  Panizzi  ? 
"Clearly,"  was  Whistler's  comment,  "the  twin  of  Fagan." 
Later  on,  J.  talked  to  him  about  the  book,  but  of  this  talk  I  heard 
little.  He  said,  when  Kennedy  regretted  that  he  did  not  seem  up 
to  the  mark,  that  he  was  not  and  for  this  once  we  must  bear  with 
him.  He  followed  us  down  when  we  left  and  stood  on  the  steps, 
looking  as  if  he  had  forgotten  why  he  was  there,  or,  indeed,  that 
he  was  there.  And  I  carried  away  such  an  impression  of  him  as 
I  have  never  had  before — of  Whistler  suddenly  grown  old  and  thin 
and  shrunken  and  sad. 

On  this  evening  at  Garlant's  dinner  was  served  in  a  dining-room 
upstairs,  on  the  second  floor,  where  we  had  never  dined  before. 
We  learned  afterwards  that  it  was  Whistler's  sitting-room  once 
when  he  stayed  at  Garlant's  with  Mrs.  Whistler.  He  had  not  been 
in  it  since,  and  no  doubt  this  fact  accounts  for  his  extreme  melan 
choly.  We  remember  evenings  when  he  came  to  us  sad  and  de 
pressed,  especially  during  the  first  year  after  Mrs.  Whistler's 
death,  but  never  another  evening  when  nothing  could  lift  the 
depression  or  make  him  forget  the  sadness. 

Fagan  was  Louis  Fagan,  an  official  in  the  Print  Room  of  the  British 
Museum.  Panizzi  probably  did  more  than  any  other  Librarian 
to  make  the  Library  of  the  British  Museum  what  it  is.  Grimaldi 

74 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

was  one  of  the  several  secretaries  Whistler  picked  up  during  these 
years.  The  wonder  was  where  he  found  them  and  why  he  employed 
them,  of  so  little  use  did  they  seem  to  him. 

Wednesday,  July  nth.  An  early  visit  from  Whistler,  who  says  he 
will  come  this  evening  to  meet  our  West  Point  man,  Captain 
Charles  M.  Hunter,  and  his  wife,  who  are  fresh  from  the  Academy, 
after  a  four  years'  term  and  are  over  here  on  a  holiday  before  going 
to  San  Francisco. 

When  they  came  in  the  evening — before  him,  of  course — they  were 
delighted  at  the  chance  of  meeting  him.  He  has  become  a  tradition 
at  West  Point,  where  on  a  certain  stairway,  hung  with  the  work 
of  cadets,  his  drawings  hold  a  place  of  honour.  He  was  a  little  late, 
and  was  more  than  usually  cordial  and  distinguished  and  elegant 
— the  West  Point  officer  in  perfection.  At  dinner,  naturally,  the 
first  talk  was  of  the  Chinese.  "Here  are  these  people,  thousands 
of  years  older  in  civilization  than  we,  with  a  religion  thousands 
of  years  older  than  ours,  and  our  missionaries  go  out  there  and 
tell  them  who  God  is!  It  is  simply  preposterous,  you  know,  that 
for  what  Europe  and  America  consider  a  question  of  honour,  one 
blue  pot  should  be  risked." 

There  were  two  moments  when  West  Point  failed  him.  He  asked 
Captain  Hunter  of  what  branch  he  had  been  professor  "Artillery 
Tactics,  no  doubt?" — he  is  in  the  Third  U.  S.  Artillery — and 
Captain  Hunter  said,  "No,  French  and  English."  We  rather 
gasped  at  that,  but  as  Whistler  said  afterwards,  it  was  better  not 
to  pursue  the  matter.  The  other  moment:  talking  of  the  Boers, 
and  after  he  quoted  the  instances  he  loves  about  Buller,  Roberts 
and  the  rest,  some  one  asked  Captain  Hunter  what  West  Point 
thought  of  the  blunders  at  the  opening  campaign.  "Oh,"  he  said, 
"it  was  what  always  happened  with  Generals  who  had  not  had  that 
sort  of  experience  for  years,  what  happened  at  Santiago  when  two 
divisions  of  the  U.  S.  Army  were  drawn  up  so  that,  if  they  had 
fired,  they  must  have  shot  each  other  down."  This,  Whistler  passed 
over,  and  was  on  safer  ground  when  he  asked  about  West  Point 
and  the  changes  that  had  been  made.  He  seemed  to  remember 
the  buildings  in  every  possible  detail.  He  was  disgusted  when 
1900]  75 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

he  heard  that  the  cadets  now  play  football.  "They  should  hold 
themselves  apart  and  not  allow  the  other  colleges  and  universities 
to  dispute  with  them  for  a  ball  kicked  round  the  field — it  is  beneath 
the  dignity  of  officers  of  the  United  States."  The  Hunters  were 
certainly  appreciative  and  understood  enough  to  be  appreciative 
in  the  right  places.  But  there  was  another  shock  when  the  Captain 
explained  that  his  wound  at  Porto  Rico  was  the  result  of  his  going 
out  with  some  other  officers  to  dinner  one  evening  and  putting  on 
white  trousers  when  the  army  weren't  wearing  them,  and  being 
shot  in  consequence,  by  the  American  sentry  when  he  came  back 
to  camp.  But,  on  the  whole,  it  seemed  to  me  that  just  as  we  are 
more  American  than  the  Americans  who  stay  at  home,  so  Whistler 
is  more  West  Point,  according  to  his  notion  of  it,  than  the  men  who 
have  never  come  out  of  it. 

We  remember  that  the  next  day  Captain  Hunter  was  suddenly 
ordered  off  to  China.  He  had  no  uniform,  as  he  was  in  Europe  on 
leave,  and  he  was  forced  to  get  one  at  once  in  London.  He  went 
for  it  to  the  Army  and  Navy  Stores.  His  delight  was  great,  and 
he  refused  to  make  any  change,  when  it  was  sent  to  him  with  the 
bronze  letters  S.  U.,  instead  of  U.  S.,  on  the  collar.  Whistler, 
when  we  told  him,  was  even  more  pleased  with  the  ignorance  and 
invention  of  the  Islanders. 

Thursday,  July  I2th.  Dined  at  the  Fisher  Unwins.  Whistler, 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Hilaire  Belloc,  and  Mrs.  Maurice  Hewlett  there. 
Whistler  was  quite  away  from  where  I  sat,  so  that  I  saw  nothing  of 
him  during  dinner,  but  Mrs.  Hewlett  said  afterwards  he  had  been 
telling  her  extraordinary  things  about  niggers  and  Boers,  and 
Belloc  was  insisting  that  at  every  house  he  went  to  he  met  only 
Pro-Boers,  that  everybody  really  was  Pro-Boer,  and  he,  because 
of  his  disgust  for  the  English  outburst  over  the  Dreyfus  case,  was 
in  sympathy  with  the  Boers;  and  so  was  Mrs.  Belloc,  who  despite 
an  extraordinary  gown  of  blue  silk  and  white  sort  of  cloak  that 
hung  loose  and  shapeless,  and  made  her  back  view  suggest  a  High 
Priest  of  some  strange  Oriental  sect,  was  as  sensible.  Mrs.  Hewlett, 
in  Empire  dress,  said  she  was  frankly  out  of  it,  but  she  thought 
76  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

she  ought  to  be  just  a  little  offended  at  being  made  to  feel  by 
Whistler — I  don't  know  how,  for  I  did  not  hear  the  talk — that  she 
was  just  a  plain,  bourgeois,  middle-class  person,  when  everybody 
else  thought  she  was  just  the  other  thing. 

We  stayed  on  after  the  others.  Whistler  admitted  to  a  passing 
shock  when  he  heard  of  the  French  and  English  professorship  at 
West  Point,  but  it  was  only  passing.  The  Captain  was,  after  all, 
West  Point.  He  was  pleased  at  their  telling  him  how  he  was 
remembered  there  and  how  the  old  officers  who  had  been  at  West 
Point  at  the  same  time  often  spoke  of  him,  but  liked  less  well  the 
reminder  that  his  was  the  class  of  '54.  He  and  J.  and  I  started 
home  together,  but  could  find  no  four-wheeler,  and  so  had  to  break 
up  into  two  hansoms. 

Saturday,  July  ifih.  Went  to  tea  in  Whistler's  studio,  Fitzroy 
Street.  Mrs.  Ohl  and  her  little  girl,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Louis  Fagan, 
Miss  Philip,  Kennedy,  and  an  American  artist,  Elwell,  there.  "  We 
have  been  having  splendid  news,"  was  his  greeting  to  me,  and  he 
began  to  read  the  leader  in  Thursday's  Star,  about  the  taking  of 
an  Irish  squadron  and  the  Lincolns,  by  the  Boers  at  a  kopje  com 
paratively  near  Pretoria. 

Mr.  Fagan  had  a  story  of  a  drawing  brought  to  him  by  some  one 
who  declared  it  to  be  by  Frith.  He  saw  at  once  that,  though 
immature  and  boyish,  it  was  something  of  importance,  and  he 
wrote  to  Frith  that  he  had  something  to  show  him,  and  Frith 
came  promptly  the  next  morning,  and  explained  that  it  was  a 
drawing  he  made  when  he  was  six  years  old!  "It  must  have  been 
then  he  tossed  up!"  Whistler  suggested. 

He  showed  us  some  of  the  things  he  has  been  doing  lately — his 
portrait  of  Miss  Philip  in  hat  and  boa  close  round  her  throat — 
the  Little  Lady  Sophie  that  he  has  worked  on  since  the  International 
last  year,  giving  it  finer  colour  and  tone,  the  Lillie  in  Our  Alley, 
pastels  of  the  nude,  and  then  some  of  the  marines — water  colours 
he  did  at  Dieppe.  I  left  them  all  there,  to  find  later  that  the 
contrast  between  Mrs.  Ohl,  the  Southern  woman,  and  Mrs.  Fagan, 
the  British  matron,  delighted  him  enormously. 
1900]  77 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

The  present  generation  may  have  forgotten  not  Frith,  for  it  is 
said  that  the  British  art  lovers  at  the  National  Gallery  continue  to 
pass  Whistler's  Little  White  Girl  to  stare  at  Frith's  Derby  Day, 
but  Frith's  explanation  of  the  " toss-up"  it  had  been  whether  or 
no  he  was  to  become  an  artist,  his  father  wanting  him  to  be  an 
auctioneer.  Whistler  made  use  of  this  in  the  report  of  the  Ruskin 
trial  published  in  Art  and  Art  Critics.  But  his  personal  opinion  of 
Frith  for  testifying  against  him  did  not  extend  to  all  of  Frith's  art. 
For  one  day,  walking  through  the  National  Gallery  with  J., Whistler 
stopped  before  the  Derby  Day ,  then  hung  in  a  Modern  British  Room, 
and  pointing  to  the  Grand  Stand  and  the  distant  crowd,  he  said 
"How  did  he  do  it?  It's  as  good  as  Manet."  And  when  J.  told 
it  to  Frith,  Frith  was  nearly  paralyzed,  though  we  doubt  if  he 
knew  who  Manet  was. 

Sunday,  July  i$th.  Dined  at  Garlant's  Hotel  with  Whistler,  the 
last  little  dinner  of  four  before  Kennedy's  departure,  he  having 
put  off  going  for  a  day,  so  we  could  have  the  parting  celebration. 
Of  course,  it  was  about  half  past  eight  when  we  sat  down.  Whistler 
was  in  fine  form.  J.  asked  him  how  he  got  on  at  Short's  on  Friday, 
where  he  went  to  print  some  of  his  Paris  plates.  "Well,  I  pulled 
nineteen  prints.  Once  I  started,  all  the  joy  in  it  came  back  again, 
and  I  got  through  by  lunch  time."  J.  thought  he  would  have  been 
at  it  all  day,  and,  indeed,  when  Short  did  not  turn  up  at  the  Art 
Workers'  Guild  on  Friday  evening,  supposed  the  printing  was 
still  going  on.  "H'm,  h'm,"  Whistler  said,  "well,  you  know,  my 
consideration  for  others  quite  equals  my  own  energy." 
He  was  in  a  reminiscent  mood.  Told  the  story  of  The  Piano 
Picture.  "It  was  the  second  picture  I  painted.  The  first  was  the 
Mere  Gerard,  done  in  Paris,  which  I  gave  to  Swinburne.  In  The 
Piano  Picture  my  sister,  then  Mrs.  Haden,  is  sitting  at  the  piano, 
her  little  girl  standing  by  it,  and  I  gave  it  to  Haden — in  a  way. 
Well,  you  know,  it  was  hanging  there  but  I  had  no  particular  satis 
faction  in  that.  Haden  just  then  was  playing  the  authority  on  art 
and  he  could  never  look  at  it  without  pointing  out  its  faults — and 
telling  me  it  would  never  get  into  the  Academy — that  was  certain. 
But  after  it  had  been  for  awhile  on  Haden's  walls  I  did  send  it  to 
the  Academy  and  it  was  hung,  and  Phillip,  the  R.  A.,  back  from 
78  •  .  [190° 


THE    PURPLE  CAP 

PASTEL 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum 
(See  page  235) 


1 


LITTLE  NUDE 

PASTEL 

Formerly  in  the  Canfield  Collection 


BOULEVARD  POISSONIERE 

ETCHING.      M.    423 


BALUSTRADE,    LUXEMBOURG 

ETCHING.       M.    427 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

Spain  with,  well,  you  know,  Spanish  notions  about  things,  asked 
who  painted  the  picture,  and  they  told  him  a  youth  no  one  knew 
about,  who  had  appeared  from  no  one  knew  where.  Phillip  looked 
up  my  address  in  the  Catalogue  and  wrote  to  me  at  once  to  say 
he  would  like  to  buy  it,  and  what  was  its  price?  I  answered  in  a 
letter  which  I  am  sure  must  have  been  very  beautiful.  I  said 
that  in  my  youth  and  inexperience  I  did  not  know  about  these 
things  and  would  leave  to  him  the  question  of  price.  Phillip  sent 
me  thirty  pounds.  [When  the  picture  was  last  sold,  to  Edmund 
Davis,  it  brought  two  thousand,  eight  hundred.]  Haden  did  some 
times  buy  my  work,  you  know,  my  dear  sister  was  in  the  house 
and  women  have  their  ideas  about  things,  and  so  I  did  what  she 
wanted  to  please  her — and  for  the  Ice  picture — The  Thames  in  Ice, 
The  Twenty-Fifth  of  December — Haden  gave  me  ten  pounds."  But 
there  came  a  time,  when  notwithstanding  his  sister  in  the  house, 
things  could  not  go  on  as  they  were. 

He  lingered  over  the  Chelsea  days,  Rossetti,  Legros,  all  the  won 
derful  things !  "  Legros,  I  came  upon  in  Paris,  where,  as  a  surprising 
youth  suddenly  appearing  in  the  group  of  French  students  from 
no  one  knew  where,  with  my  Mere  Gerard  and  The  Piano  Picture 
for  introduction,  I  made  friends  with  Fantin  and  Legros,  men  who 
had  already  arrived,  and  Courbet,  whom  they  were  all  raving 
about,  and  who  was  very  kind  to  me.  I  came  upon  Legros  at  one 
moment  in  so  deplorable  a  condition  that  it  needed,  well,  you  know, 
God  or  a  lesser  person  to  pull  him  out  of  it.  And  so,  I  brought  him 
over  to  London,  andi  for  awhile  he  worked  in  my  studio.  He  had 
before  coming  sold  a  church  interior  to  Haden,  a  little  interior  of 
a  church  with  kneeling  figures  of  women.  It  was  when  Haden  was 
etching  and  used  to  lock  himself  up  in  his  room  at  the  top  of  the 
house,  glorying  in  the  artist  who  let  the  surgery  business  slide. 
He  liked  Legros'  picture,  though  he  found  the  floor  out  of  perspec 
tive.  One  day  he  took  it  to  the  room  upstairs  where  he  did  his 
etching  and  turned  the  key.  When  it  reappeared,  the  floor  was 
in  perspective,  according  to  Haden.  A  gorgeous  frame  was 
bought,  and  the  picture  was  hung  conspicuously  in  the  drawing 
room,  and  left  there,  though  Haden  was  just  a  bit  restive  when 
1900]  79 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

he  heard  that  Legros  was  in  London.  When  Legros  came  with  me 
to  Haden's  the  first  time,  he  was  fearfully  impressed  with  the  frame, 
having  been  used  to  see  himself  in  any  shabby  old  frame  that  came 
his  way.  But  gradually  Haden's  work  dawned  upon  him.  That 
he  could  not  stand.  What  was  he  to  do?  Run  off  with  it,  I  sug 
gested.  We  got  it  down,  called  a  four-wheeler,  and  carried  it 
away  to  the  studio — to  our  own  little  kopje — [for  Whistler  told 
the  story  in  the  days  of  the  Boer  war] — cleaned  off  Haden's  work. 
Haden,  in  a  rage  when  he  discovered  it  had  gone,  hurried  after  us 
to  the  studio,  but  when  he  saw  it  on  the  easel,  Legros  repainting 
the  perspective,  well  there  was  nothing  to  say." 
J.  referred  to  the  other  piano  picture  Keppel  told  us  about,  the  boy 
Haden  at  the  piano,  with  head  turned,  still  at  Haden's,  but 
Whistler  knew  nothing  of  it.  The  White  Girl — the  big  one — was 
painted  in  Paris,  and  gave  him  a  place  among  the  Independants. 
In  the  portrait  group  by  Fantin  he  is  in  the  centre  at  the  table, 
in  front  of  Delacroix,  holding  a  bunch  of  flowers — The  Hommage 
a  Delacroix  in  the  Moreau  Nelaton  Collection  in  the  Louvre. 
The  Mere  Gerard,  he  said,  "I  must  have  back  from  Swinburne. 
Time  has  changed  the  conditions  of  the  gift,  and  therefore  of 
course,  as  will  be  understood  among  gentlemen,  the  gift  must 
be  returned." 

Whistler  went  to  Sir  Frank  Short,  whom  he  rightly  regarded  as  an 
eminent  technician,  to  get  proofs  of  his  Paris  plates.  These  were 
the  plates  that  he  bit  and  printed  in  Paris  with  J.  But  the  ground, 
which  he  laid,  was  bad  and  came  off,  and  the  prints  he  pulled, 
after  he  bit  them  as  far  as  he  could,  were  in  many  places  weak. 
Curiously,  Whistler  was  afraid  to  re-ground  them,  or  to  allow 
Lamour,  the  old  etching  material  maker  in  Paris,  to  do  it,  though 
Lamour  offered  to  and  sent  Whistler  and  J.  re-grounding  rollers 
for  the  purpose.  This  was  in  1893,  and  it  was  not  until  1900  that 
he  did  anything  with  the  plates  and  then,  as  we  have  said,  he  went 
to  Short,  whom  he  trusted  and  who  had  a  good  press,  rather  than 
to  Goulding,  whose  "little  tricks"  and  "dodges"  he  thought  of 
"the  cheapest  kind,"  while  Sir  Frank  Short  is  the  best  technician 
in  Great  Britain.  And  these  prints  by  Short,  as  far  as  we  know, 
are  the  last  that  were  pulled  from  Whistler's  Paris  plates.  Short 
offered  to  re-ground  them,  but  we  do  not  think  that  Whistler  let 
80  [1900 


LA  MERE  GERARD 

ETCHING.  M.  II 


(Sc  e  page  Q3) 


READING  BY  LAMPLIGHT 
Seymour  Haden,  left;  Traer,  centre;  Lady  Haden,  right 

ETCHING.    M.    33 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

him  do  so.  He  did,  however,  after  Whistler's  death,  bite  a  plate 
which  mysteriously  came  into  Way's  or  Walter  Sickert's  possession 
and  which  was  later  published.  Mr.  Mansfield  has  described  it 
among  the  Attributions.  Short,  some  years  later,  referred  to  this 
printing  in  a  lecture  on  etching  at  South  Kensington  to  which 
we  went: — 

November  27th,  1913.  He  dragged  in  Whistler  with  measured 
praise,  though  in  the  end  he  told  how  Whistler  came  to  him  to 
print  his  plates  and  how,  when  Short  asked  him  about  wiping  the 
plates,  Whistler  said,  "Wipe  them  as  clean  as  you  can — what  was 
good  enough  for  Rembrandt  is  good  enough  for  me."  The  impres 
sion  given  was  that,  at  the  last,  this  was  the  sort  of  printing 
Whistler  wanted  when,  as  J.  said  after  the  lecture,  Whistler  was 
just  trying  the  plates  to  see  what  was  in  them — he  never  printed 
them  after  that  or,  no  doubt,  the  results  would  have  been  different. 
Short  is  not  the  only  Academician  who  can  praise  Whistler's 
work.  Indeed,  their  praise  sometimes  makes  one  wonder  why  they 
did  not  show  their  appreciation  practically  and  make  him  a 
member  of  their  Academy. 

As  for  the  Art  Workers'  Guild,  their  knowledge  of  Whistler  was 
so  slight  that  when,  less  than  a  year  after  Whistler's  death,  Way 
gave  a  talk  about  him,  it  was  announced  in  the  Guild's  circular 
as  a  talk  about  "John  McNeill  Whistler  and  his  Work."  As 
Whistler  said  on  another  occasion,  "the  gentlemen  might  have 
asked."  What  Delatre  in  the  early  Paris  days  thought  of  Whistler's 
printing,  he  probably  never  let  Whistler  know,  though  he  did  not 
hesitate  to  tell  others.  Frederick  Keppel  had  many  amusing 
stories  of  Delatre  who,  he  said,  could  not  help  what  some  people 
might  think  stealing  and,  as  printer,  kept  his  finest  proofs  for 
himself.  Whistler  knew  this  and  determined  to  take  his  plates 
from  Delatre.  He  brought  them  to  Goupil's  in  Paris  and  made  an 
arrangement  to  sell  them  the  prints  at  a  certain  price.  He  had 
hardly  gone  when  Delatre  brought  them  prints  of  the  same  plates 
and  asked  about  twice  as  much.  They  told  him  his  price  was  far 
higher  than  Whistler's.  "Yes,"  said  Delatre,  "but  then  my  prints 
are  far  finer  than  his."  To  our  regret,  Delatre  left  no  records  or 
reminiscences  with  his  son,  also  a  printer.  E.  went  to  see  the 
younger  Delatre  in  search  of  information: — 

1900]  8 1 

6 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

May  ifth,  1909.  Though  he  was  charming  and  friendly,  he  had 
nothing  to  tell  me  and  apparently  knew  less  about  his  father's 
printing  for  Whistler  than  we  do.  He  said  his  father's  old  place 
was  opposite  to  where  I  found  him  in  the  Rue  Lepic,  but  up  almost 
at  the  top  of  Montmartre  and  he  had  never  heard  of  the  printing 
house  in  the  Rue  St.  Jacques  described  by  the  De  Goncourts,  of 
whose  description  he  knew  as  little.  In  the  later  days  he  met 
Whistler  who  once  or  twice  came  en  ami  to  shake  the  hand  of  an 
old  friend.  He  could  find  only  two  letters  from  Whistler  to  his 
father,  one  written  at  Speke  Hall,  the  other  at  the  Hotel  du  Bon 
Lafontaine.  He  had  never  seen  Whistler's  etching  of  his  father 
who,  he  feared,  was  careless  in  such  matters  and  had  not  kept 
proofs  of  the  plates  he  pulled.  He  was  so  amiable  and  so  willing 
to  tell  anything  and  everything,  it  was  the  more  provoking  that 
he  had  nothing  to  tell. 

To  go  back  to  the  rest  of  Whistler's  long  talk  on  the  evening  of 
July  1 5th.  Colonel  Hecker  of  Detroit  now  owns  The  Piano  Picture. 
The  Thames  in  Ice  is  in  the  National  Collection  at  Washington. 
Both  were  bought  by  Mr.  J.  J.  Cowan  for  two  thousand  pounds 
from  Sir  Seymour  Haden.  Mr.  Croal  Thomson,  when  giving  us  the 
information,  thought  Haden  had  bought  back  The  Piano  Picture 
at  the  Phillip  sale  after  Phillip's  death.  McLure  Hamilton  in  a 
long  talk  on  the  subject,  pointed  out  to  us  a  detail  in  The  Piano 
Picture  with  an  explanation  that  we  believe  has  not  occurred  to 
most  artists: — 

March  $thy  1909.  Whistler's  treatment  oi  perspective  in  it — his 
giving  a  curve  to  a  straight  line  so  as  to  carry  the  eye  into  the  room. 
The  wainscot,  behind  the  piano  and  the  pictures,  curves  downward 
and  Mr.  Hamilton  was  sure  Whistler  did  this  on  purpose  to  take 
away  from  the  austerity  of  the  straight  lines  of  the  pictures  above, 
and  also  because,  after  this  gentle  curving  towards  the  centre,  the 
lines  of  the  wainscot  lead  one's  eyes  far  into  the  room  from 
either  side  and  so  express  the  size  or  space.  I  was  particularly 
interested  because,  at  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  shortly 
before  this  talk  with  Mr.  Hamilton,  Humphry  Ward  tried  to 
prove  to  me  that  the  wainscot  curved  because  Whistler  could  not 
82  [1900 


DELATRE 

ETCHING.  M.  26 


FUMETTE  CROUCHING 

ETCHING.  M.  13 
(See  page  QI) 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

draw — the  critic  does  not  see  with  the  eyes  of  the  artist.  All  the 
same,  the  curve  is  a  mistake.  However  explained,  it  hits  you 
and  therefore  the  picture  is  not  finished  according  to  Whistler's 
teaching  that  in  the  finished  work  all  traces  of  how  it  is  done  must 
be  obliterated.  The  use  of  this  curve,  whether  designed  or  an 
accident,  is  not  a  success  and  we  regret  never  having  asked  him 
about  it. 

Whistler's  friendship  with  Legros  and  Fantin — their  "Society  of 
Three" — was  one  of  the  pleasantest  episodes  of  his  early  years  and 
his  letters  to  Fantin,  some  of  which  M.  Benedite,  Conservateur  du 
Luxembourg,  published  in  the  Gazette  des  Beaux-Arts  in  1905,  are 
among  his  most  interesting.  His  friendship  was  not  all  on  paper. 
He  was  in  a  position  to  be  of  use  to  both  and  he  turned  it  to  the 
best  account  as  Fantin  always  acknowledged.  The  clue  to  the 
deplorable  condition  in  which  he  found  Legros  we  had  some  years 
later  from  M.  Oulevey,  one  of  the  little  group  of  French  students 
Whistler  knew  and  loved.  Legros'  father  had  died  leaving  many 
debts  and,  according  to  French  law,  Legros  was  obliged  to  pay  the 
creditors  and  he  was  without  a  sou.  The  creditors  could  have 
pursued  him  as  a  French  citizen  to  London  and,  to  protect  himself, 
he  was  naturalized  as  promptly  as  possible,  and  not,  as  he  himself 
used  to  say,  "to  be  able  to  boast  that  he  had  gained  the  battle  of 
Waterloo."  Unfortunately,  he  and  Whistler  quarreled  soon  after 
he  got  to  London.  We  wanted,  naturally,  to  have  Legros'  mem 
ories  and  impressions  for  the  Life,  but  it  was  impossible.  We  were 
assured  that  M.  Lanteri  had  more  influence  with  him  than  any 
body.  When  we  asked  him  if  he  could  and  would  use  it  for  us, 
he  hesitated,  was  afraid  if  Legros  could  be  induced  to  say  anything 
it  would  be  coloured  by  his  bitterness.  Still  he  did  what  he  could. 
Legros,  however,  would  not  speak.  He  had  not  even  then  forgiven 
Whistler,  many  as  were  the  years  that  had  passed  and  whatever 
the  cause  of  the  quarrel  may  have  been.  William  Michael  Rossetti, 
a  mine  of  information,  informed  us  that  the  cause  was  women  and 
that  he  thought  the  details,  which  he  wrote  out  for  us,  were  unfit 
for  publication,  and  he  was  right.  The  crisis  came  in  the  office  of 
Mr.  Luke  lonides,  from  whom  we  had  an  account  of  it.  Whistler 
and  Legros  by  chance  dropped  into  the  office  the  same  afternoon. 
They  were  talking  together  when,  suddenly,  lonides  heard  Legros 
say  to  Whistler,  "You  lie!"  That  was  enough.  Whistler  knocked 
him  down.  lonides  did  what  he  could  to  get  them  to  make  it  up, 
1900]  83 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

reminding  them  what  good  friends  they  had  been.  It  was  no  use. 
Legros  had  another  grievance  against  Whistler.  Some  one  who 
wanted  copies  of  pictures  at  Bath  House  consulted  Rossetti,  and, 
through  Whistler,  gave  the  commission  to  Fantin,  and  'Legros 
thought  it  should  have  come  to  him;  he  could  do  the  work  as  well 
as  Fantin.  lonides  suggested  to  Whistler  that  he  should  apologize 
to  Legros.  So  did  Rossetti.  Whistler  regretted  the  liberty  taken 
with  lonides'  office  but  grew  wrathful  at  the  suggestion  of  an 
apology.  "A  man  gives  you  the  lie  to  ybur  face  and  you  naturally 
strike  him."  It  was  a  simple  chastisement  of  a  gross  insult  and  he 
could  not  understand  why  everybody  was  so  disturbed.  And  from 
that  day  we  doubt  if  the  two  men  ever  spoke  to  each  other,  even 
ever  met.  If  all  Whistler's  letters  to  Fantin  are  eventually  pub 
lished,  the  truth  may  come  out,  but  Madame  Fantin,  in  whose 
possession  they  still  were  the  last  time  we  saw  her,  said  passages 
in  them  were  not  over  friendly  to  Legros  and  these  she  felt  should 
not  be  seen  by  the  public.  She  promised  them  to  us,  but  M. 
Benedite  objected,  saying  she  had  promised  them  to  him  first 
and  he  intended  publishing  them,  which  he  never  has,  and  no  use 
has  yet  been  made  of  the  letters.  M.  Benedite,  arriving  in  America 
during  the  autumn  of  this  year,  was  heralded  by  puffs  of  himself 
as  the  man  who  first  discovered  Whistler,  who  managed  the  first 
exhibition  of  Whistler's  work,  who  bought  the  portrait  of  Whistler's 
Mother  in  the  name  of  the  French  Government.  Whistler  and 
Whistler's  work  were  known  in  Paris  long  before  M.  Benedite  was 
heard  of.  Exhibitions  were  given  by  Whistler  as  early  as  1874  when 
M.  Benedite  must  have  been  still  a  boy.  M.  Benedite's  name  never 
appeared  publicly  in  any  of  the  transactions  for  the  purchase  of 
the  Mother  and  we  are  not  sure  that  he  had  any  connection  with 
the  Luxembourg  or  even  the  French  Government  at  the  time. 
But  M.  Benedite  was  responsible  for  the  Paris  Memorial  Show,  as 
he  might  not  have  been  had  not  J.  and  Lavery  handed  over  the 
London  Memorial  show  to  him.  And  the  Paris  exhibition  was 
disgracefully  hung,  in  unsuitable  rooms.  M.  Jacque  Blanche  said 
of  it  that,  while  the  London  exhibition  made  Whistler  look  like 
a  great  man  who  now  and  again  made  a  mistake,  the  Paris  exhibi 
tion  made  him  look  like  a  little  man  who  now  and  again  did  some 
thing  good." 
Finally,  Whistler  told  George  W.  Smalley: 

"The  French  Government  took  the  initiative  step  and  le  Ministre 
de  rinstruction  Publique  et  des  Beaux-Arts  wrote  himself  direct  to 
me  personally,  asking  if  I  would  l  ceder  ce  tableau  au  Gouvernement 
84  [1900 


BIBI  LALOUETTE 

ETCHING.      M.   51 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

Franfais' — and  trusting  that,  in  such  case,  my  conditions  might 
not  prove  an  obstacle  to  its  purchase. 

Such  a  demarche  on  the  part  of  the  Government  is  openly  acknowl 
edged  to  be  quite  unheard  of  and  is  equivalent  to  and  universally 
accepted  as  an  official  engagement  that  the  picture  goes  to  the 
Louvre! — this  is  simply  the  greatest  honour  that  can  possibly  be 
conferred  upon  an  Artist — and  it  occurs  to  me  in  my  lifetime! 
You  may  therefore  write  and  congratulate  me." 

And  there  is  not  one  word  of  M.  Benedite. 

There  was  no  quarrel  with  Fantin  who,  after  Whistler's  death, 
wrote  of  him  with  real  affection.  Of  Fantin's  feelings  as  long  as 
Whistler  was  alive,  we  have  different  versions.  In  the  earlier  years 
of  their  friendship  he  said  in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Edwin  Edwards  that 
his  love  for  Whistler  was  like  that  of  a  man  for  the  mistress  he 
adores  despite  the  trouble  she  gives.  But  they  drifted  apart. 
Fantin  was  less  often  in  London.  When  Whistler  lived  in  the 
Rue  du  Bac  he  went  occasionally  to  see  Fantin,  but  Fantin  never 
returned  the  visit,  making  the  excuse  that  he  had  too  much  to  do, 
he  had  no  time  for  visits.  This  we  heard  from  Madame  Fantin, 
and  M.  Duret  has  confirmed  it  by  describing  Fantin's  life  to  us  as 
one  of  such  complete  retirement  with  his  wife  and  her  sister,  that 
he  probably  would  never  have  gone  out  at  all  had  he  not  been 
something  of  a  gourmet.  It  was  to  a  shop  where  they  kept  the  best 
Camembert  cheese  and  another  where  they  made  the  best  patisserie 
that  he  took  his  daily  walks.  Once  in  the  Eighties  Whistler  came 
to  Fantin's  with  Maud,  introducing  her  as  the  daughter  of  a  friend 
whom  he  was  seeing  back  to  London.  Then  Madame  Fantin  said, 
they  heard  he  behaved  badly  to  her  and  it  had  made  a  difference 
with  Mr.  Lucas.  But  they  knew  nothing  of  it  and  Fantin  was 
friendly  and  admired  him  to  the  end,  which  does  not  agree  with 
another  story  we  had  from  Keppel.  After  Whistler's  death,  Fantin 
could  not  understand  why  he  did  not  hear  again  from  Deschamps, 
at  one  time  Durand  Ruel's  manager  in  London,  who  had  written 
to  him  for  us;  he  was  willing  to  give  all  the  information  he  could 
to  Whistler's  biographers — to  us. 

Keppel's  introduction  to  Fantin  was  an  article  about  his  lithographs 
which  Keppel  wrote  for  The  Century.  Fantin  was  pleased  and  Kep 
pel,  the  next  time  he  was  in  Paris,  called,  bringing  with  him  a 
portfolio  of  prints  he  thought  would  be  of  interest  to  Fantin,  as 
they  were,  none  more  so  than  Whistler's  Bibi  Lalouette,  with  its 
1900]  85 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

memories.  Keppel  gave  it  to  him.  Fantin  placed  it  carefully  in  a 
cupboard  where  he  kept  his  prints,  locked  the  door,  put  the  key 
in  his  pocket.  Half  way  across  the  studio,  he  stopped,  hesitated, 
went  back,  unlocked  the  cupboard,  took  out  the  print  and  handed 
it  to  Keppel.  "No,"  he  said,  "I  cannot  keep  the  work  of  a  man 
for  whose  character  I  have  so  little  respect."  Probably  the  truth 
is  that  the  two  men  were  friends  when  they  most  needed  each  other. 
Two  other  early  Paris  friends  and  fellow  students,  Drouet  and 
Oulevey,  we  met  a  few  years  after  Whistler's  death.  Our  talks 
with  them  rounded  out  so  well  our  talks  on  his  student  days  with 
Whistler  in  1900  that  we  think  it  appropriate  to  quote  here,  almost 
in  full,  a  note  from  a  later  volume  of  The  Journal  which  records  our 
meeting.  We  were  in  Paris  in  May,  1907,  as  usual  for  the  Salons, 
but  no  work  was  then  as  important  as  getting  together  Whistler 
material.  This  is  the  note: 

Friday,  May  loth,  1907.  Went  early  to  see  Oulevey,  whose  address 
Drouet  gave  us  with  a  card  to  him.  Living  in  the  Passage  des 
Favorites,  away  at  the  other  end  of  the  Rue  Vaugirard.  Entrance 
through  a  gate  into  a  garden.  His  apartment  on  the  ground  floor, 
immediately  to  the  left.  I  was  received  by  him,  a  little  old  man 
with  wild,  thin,  long,  white  hair  and  straggling  white  beard  and 
moustache,  looking  much  older  than  Whistler,  miserable  and  poor, 
but  charming,  with  something  in  his  manner  that  recalled  Whistler. 
He  spoke  of  Whistler  with  unmistakable  affection.  He  was  tout 
a  fait  un  homme  a  part.  Oulevey  had  been  ires  lie  with  him,  knew 
him  first  when  he  lived  in  a  hotel  in  the  Rue  St.  Sulpice.  Then  at 
No.  i,  Rue  Bourbon-le-Chateau  near  St.  Germain-des-Pres,  then 
at  Rue  Campagne-Premiere.  They  used  to  eat  often  at  Lalouette's, 
also  at  Madame  Bachimont's  in  the  Place  de  la  Sorbonne,  a  sort 
of  cremerie.  Whistler  took  the  American  Consul  to  dine  there 
once,  and  on  that  occasion  gave  a  new  hat  to  the  daughter  of  the 
house,  known  as  "Canichon,"  who  was  to  dine  with  them.  When 
he  was  in  the  Hotel,  Rue  St.  Sulpice,  a  little  girl  lived  with  him, 
Fumette,  in  whom  he  was  much  interested  because  she  knew 
Musset  by  heart  and  could  recite  the  verses  to  him.  He  thought 
something  should  be  done  for  a  woman  with  such  a  gift.  It  was 
she  who,  in  a  rage  one  day  when  he  was  out,  tore  up  drawings  he 
86  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

had  made;  not  etchings,  but  drawings,  something  in  the  manner  of 
Gavarni,  of  all  sorts  of  people  and  things  in  the  Quartier — des 
amoureux  et  des  sujets  presque  enfantins.  Whistler  came  home  to 
find  them  torn  to  pieces  and  piled  upon  his  table,  and  he  was  so 
unhappy  Oulevey  says  he  cried.  In  his  unhappiness  that  evening, 
at  the  cafe,  with  Oulevey  and  Lambert,  he  drank  too  much  Kirsch, 
and  was  quite  tipsy.  Whistler,  by  no  means  a  buveur  usually, 
became  very  gay  and  insisted  that  they  should  all  go  to  supper 
in  one  of  the  open-all-night  restaurants  at  the  Halles.  Oulevey 
represented  the  lateness  of  the  hour  and  their  penniless  condition. 
But  when  Whistler  took  a  thing  into  his  head,  he  must  do  it — and 
Oulevey,  seeing  it  was  useless  to  argue,  took  two  or  three  more 
glasses  of  Kirsch  himself  to  be  in  the  right  frame  of  mind.  Whistler 
said  they  must  get  money  from  Lucas.  It  was  after  one,  but  they 
went  to  where  he  lived,  made  the  concierge  open,  and  climbed  up 
to  his  apartment.  Oulevey  and  Lambert  stayed  in  the  shadows. 
Whistler  knocked  and  knocked.  After  a  long  while,  Lucas  was 
heard  shuffling  to  the  door  which  he  opened  on  the  chain.  There 
was  an  argument.  Whistler  said  his  concierge  wouldn't  give  him 
his  key  to  let  him  into  his  room  until  he  paid  his  rent,  and  he  hadn't 
a  sou.  Every  now  and  then  he  threw  a  word  back  in  French  that 
they  might  know  how  things  were  going,  and  they  were  going  badly. 
Lucas,  no  doubt,  saw  he  had  been  drinking,  and  would  give  nothing. 
But  they  went  on  to  the  Halles  and  into  one  of  the  restaurants. 
They  had  twelve  sous  left.  They  ordered  beer,  and  as  they  drank 
it,  Whistler  began  complimenting  the  patron  on  his  cuisine  and  its 
fame;  they  had  come  for  un  petit  souper  fin.  The  patron  was 
delighted.  But  Whistler  said  it  was  not  their  habit  to  pay  at  the 
moment.  The  patron  said  it  was  not  the  habit  of  the  house  to  be 
paid  at  any  other  time.  So  they  went  to  another  restaurant.  Here, 
said  Whistler,  we  shall  say  nothing  about  payment  until  we  have 
eaten.  And  they  ate  their  supper,  all  the  while  Whistler  working 
himself  up  into  a  wild  state  of  agitation  about  Lucas.  He  must 
challenge  Lucas  to  a  duel,  and  they  must  be  his  seconds.  After 
their  supper,  he  said  as  soon  as  le  petit  jour  came,  he  would  go  and 
find  money,  and  the  three  went  to  sleep.  Oulevey  woke  up,  and 
1900]  87 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

saw  that  le  petit  jour  had  come,  but  Whistler  slept  on.  Then 
Oulevey  woke  up  again,  said  le  grand  jour  has  come,  and  Whistler 
started  to  go.  Oulevey  again  slept  peacefully,  for  he  had  learned 
that  when  Whistler  said  he  would  do  a  thing  he  always  did  it. 
The  next  thing  he  knew,  he  was  awake,  it  was  late,  and  Whistler 
was  sleeping  at  his  side.  "But  you  have  not  been,"  he  said.  "But 
I  have,"  said  Whistler,  and  he  showed  his  pockets  full  of  money, 
some  three  or  four  hundred  francs.  He  had  got  it  from  an  American 
friend  who,  Whistler  said,  abused  the  situation,  insisting  on  Whist 
ler's  stopping  to  look  at  his  pictures!  On  the  way  home,  they 
passed  the  Cafe  de  France,  and  Whistler  said  they  must  have  a 
refreshing  drink,  and  they  sat  down  outside.  Presently  they  dis 
covered  Lucas  who  was  to  be  killed  in  the  duel,  drinking  his  choco 
late  in  a  corner  inside.  But  there  was  no  more  talk  of  a  challenge. 
Another  time,  Whistler  wanted  cool  drinks  in  a  cafe  just  opposite 
his  rooms  in  Rue  Bourbon-le-Chateau,  where  they  wouldn't  give 
credit.  It  was  summer — he  could  find  no  one  to  lend  him  money 
at  the  moment — he  pawned  his  coat,  and  went  about  in  his  shirt 
sleeves  for  the  next  two  or  three  days. 

Then  there  was  a  story  of  Drouet's  heroic  Gericault,  intended  for 
a  certain  town,  but  refused  by  the  Mayor.  A  fellow  student, 
Echery,  a  short,  small  man,  had  just  died.  "  Tiens!"  said  Whistler, 
"erect  it  over  Echery's  grave."  Drouet  saw  everything  big.  He 
designed  a  monument  for  a  little  girl,  and  the  figure  lying  on  the 
tomb  was  at  least  twelve  feet  long.  When  he  was  working  on  the 
Gericault,  a  moment  came  when  there  was  no  money  to  buy  clay 
and  it  was  all  he  could  do  to  keep  his  huge  monument  covered 
with  wet  cloths  while  he  waited.  But  at  last  money  drifted  in 
from  somewhere,  clay  was  bought,  the  cloths  removed,  and  the 
monument  had  sprouted  with  mushrooms.  What  a  chance,  said 
Drouet.  And  he  sold  the  mushrooms  and  gave  them  all  a  big 
dinner,  and  much  wine  was  drunk  and  speeches  made.  Drouet 
has  been  for  years  doing  a  Joan  of  Arc  and  still  is  working  on  it  in 
the  studio,  Oulevey  said.  Henri  Martin  was  the  son  of  the  his 
torian,  a  painter  and  a  great  deal  with  Whistler.  In  the  Rue 
Campagne-Premiere,  Whistler  had  a  little  hand  press  and  pulled 
88  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

his  own  prints,  sometimes  before  the  people  who  bought  them. 
A  rich  American  friend  wanted  one  and  came  to  the  studio,  and 
Whistler  asked  a  good  price  for  it.  He  got  to  work,  prepared  his 
plate,  pulled  a  print.  It  wasn't  good  enough,  he  said,  and  he 
crumpled  it  up,  and  threw  it  in  the  ashes  in  the  fireplace,  and  the 
next  three  or  four  were  thrown  after  it.  At  last,  he  pulled  one  that 
would  do,  and,  with  every  care,  put  it  in  a  flat  box,  and  the  Ameri 
can  went  off  with  it.  No  sooner  had  he  gone  than  Whistler  pounced 
upon  the  first  print  in  the  ashes,  smoothed  and  pressed  it.  There, 
he  said,  is  the  best  proof,  and  it  is  for  me.  It  wasn't  for  the  money 
he  did  this  sort  of  thing,  but  he  seemed  to  see  the  humour  of  it. 
When  he  had  money,  he  flung  it  away.  The  story  of  his  copying 
in  the  Louvre,  Oulevey  told  with  some  new  touches.  Whistler 
helped  himself  to  a  box  of  colours.  The  owner  discovered  and 
claimed  it,  but  what  more  natural  than  the  surprise  of  Whistler 
who  supposed  the  boxes  of  colours  were  for  general  use.  He  was 
a  man  with  un  coeur  de  femme  and  la  volonte  d'un  homme.  In  the 
Alsace  journey  he  bought  a  little  iron,  and  ironed  his  shirt  and 
collar  at  night — always  must  be  perfect  in  his  dress.  It  was  not 
vanity,  but  taste,  le  gout,  that  he  brought  to  everything:  his  talk, 
his  work,  everything.  Legros  went  to  England  because  his  father 
died  deeply  in  debt  .  .  .  When  Oulevey  was  in  England  about 
eight  years  ago,  he  wrote  to  tell  Legros,  an  old  friend.  Legros  no 
doubt  thought,  "here  is  an  old  comrade  down  on  his  luck  who 
wants  to  come  and  sleep  on  my  floor  and  live  on  me,  and  bohemian- 
ize  as  in  the  old  days,"  and  in  a  prompt  answer  he  represented  the 
impossibility  for  artists  to  sell  anything  in  England,  he  himself 
sold  everything  in  France,  and  regretted  that  he  was  just  going 
away  for  an  indefinite  time.  And  Oulevey  begged  him  in  a  polite 
letter:  je  vous  prie  de  ne  pas  me  laisser  vous  faire  demenager — which 
enchanted  Whistler.  On  that  occasion  Whistler  furnished  him 
with  many  letters  and  much  advice.  Oulevey  lodged  in  a  hotel 
with  a  cousin,  where  there  were  only  merchants  of  meat,  which 
Whistler  told  him  would  be  disastrous — any  small  hotel  in  the 
French  Quarter,  Soho,  would  be  a  better  address.  Oulevey  could 
remember  nothing  of  the  show  at  Bonvin's  in  1859.  But  he  remem- 
1900]  89 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

bered  Whistler  once  going  to  see  Courbet  and  coming  back  and  say 
ing,  c'est  un  grand  homme!  C'est  un  grand  homme!  Whistler  would 
go  to  the  bookstalls  and  shops  and  look  over  the  old  books  and 
quietly  tear  out  the  blank  sheets  at  either  end  and  carry  them 
off  to  print  his  etchings  on.  He  never  worked  at  Gleyre's,  nor 
in  the  Louvre,  nor  anywhere  that  Oulevey  can  remember,  but  he 
was  always  making  the  sort  of  drawings  that  Fumette  tore  up. 
In  the  evening,  Duret,  Drouet  and  Keppel  dined  with  us  at  the 
hotel — the  Saint  Remain — alone  in  an  upstairs  room.  A  bad 
dinner,  abominably  served,  but  an  evening  of  wonderful  talk. 
Drouet's  stories  and  reminiscences  were  endless.  Becquet,  whom 
Whistler  etched,  was  a  sculptor  from  Besancon  who  died  two  or 
three  months  ago.  Drouet  was  in  great  distress  about  it,  felt 
himself  responsible.  .He  had  had  Becquet  to  dinner  and  Becquet 
drank  half  a  bottle  of  wine  and  some  cognac;  it  was  too  much  for 
him  in  his  feeble  state,  he  died  two  or  three  days  after,  and  Drouet 
never  heard  of  it  until  he  saw  an  account  of  the  funeral  in  the 
papers.  Becquet  was  a  man  loved  by  his  friends,  the  best  and 
greatest  Drouet  ever  knew,  but  he  was  unsuccessful,  unrecognized. 
He  lived  in  his  studio  where  there  was  nothing  but  disorder  and  his 
'cello,  for  he  was  a  great  musician.  Whistler  had  not  seen  him 
since  the  etching  was  made  in  1859,  and  Drouet  arranged  a  dinner 
a  few  years  before  Whistler's  death.  A  wreath  of  laurel  was  pre 
pared.  During  dinner,  Drouet  said  that  he  had  met  many  great 
men,  but,  pour  la  morale,  none  greater  than  Becquet.  Becquet 
was  moved  to  tears.  Then  Whistler  said  that  they  wanted  to  give 
him  some  little  souvenir,  and  the  laurel  wreath,  hitherto  hidden, 
was  brought  out  and  presented  to  him  by  Whistler,  and  Becquet 
broke  down,  and  said  he  would  take  it  home  and  hang  it  on  his 
wall  where  he  could  always  see  it.  Drouet  added  a  story  of  a  rich 
young  girl  of  about  twenty-five  who  came  to  Becquet's  studio 
and  offered  herself  to  him,  but  he,  then  fifty,  refused  out  of  con 
sideration  for  her  youth,  though  it  was  a  chance  any  other  man,  in 
such  terrible  poverty,  would  have  jumped  at.  Drouet  gave  him 
one  of  the  three  proofs  of  his  own  portrait  presented  to  him  by 
Whistler  and  Becquet  said  he  would  leave  it  on  his  death  to  the 
90  [1900 


BECQUET 

ETCHING.     M.  52 


FINETTE 

ETCHING.    M.   58 


AXENFELD 

ETCHING.  M.  64 


ASTRUC 

ETCHING.  M.  53 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

Museum  at  Besanc.on.  He  lived  by  playing  in  an  orchestra  at 
some  theatre.  Sarah  Bernhardt  saw  him  once  as  he  played,  was 
struck  by  his  beauty,  asked  who  he  was,  and  sent  for  him  to  come 
to  her  dressing-room.  But  he  would  not  hear  of  it — he  would 
have  nothing  to  do  with  that!  And  there  was  a  story  of  a  composer 
who  asked  Becquet  to  play  his  music;  at  first  Becquet  said  no, 
then  he  consented,  and  the  composer  wept  as  he  listened,  and  the 
two  embraced. 

Valentin,  the  father  of  Bibi  Valentin,  was  an  engraver. 
Drouet  could  not  remember  exactly  what  Axenfeld  did,  but  his 
brother  was  a  celebrated  physician  of  the  time. 
Astruc  was  not  only  editor  of  U Artiste,  but  he  painted  and  sculped, 
made  water-colours  and  wrote  verses — in  fact,  did  a  little  of  every 
thing,  and  his  wife  used  to  say  he  was  the  first  artist  since  the 
Renaissance  who  had  combined  all  the  arts. 

It  was  Eloise,  La  Fumette,  who  was  with  Whistler  in  the  Rue  St. 
Sulpice  and  tore  up  the  drawings.  She  was  a  grisette  who  liked 
to  live  with  men  she  thought  distinguished,  out  of  the  common. 
She  and  Whistler  were  together  in  misery,  for  two  years.  He 
hadn't  anything  to  give  her.  Later  she  was  the  mistress  of  a 
musician.  Then  she  went  to  South  America,  thinking  to  find  an 
opening  as  "modiste,"  but  she  was  too  old,  and  died  there.  Finette 
was  a  cocotte,  very  elegant,  who  sometimes  danced  the  cancan  in 
the  dancing  places.  She  went  to  London  to  dance  in  the  Music 
Halls,  and  they  announced  her  as  Madame  Finette  in  the  Cancan, 
la  Danse  Nationale  Fran^aise. 

Sometimes  they  made  the  feast  at  Lalouette's  restaurant  and  then 
they  ordered  cachet  vert,  a  Burgundy  at  one  franc  or  one  franc 
twenty  the  bottle,  but  only  on  great  occasions.  This  brought  a 
question  from  Duret  and  the  talk  back  to  Becquet  who,  to  the 
last,  asked  Drouet  to  dinner  in  the  little  restaurants  where  a  plat 
cost  two  sous,  where  it  was  an  event  to  spend  a  franc,  and  where 
forty  sous  would  pay  for  a  banquet  with  all  the  delicacies  of  the 
season.  But  they  were  seldom  so  extravagant,  though  often  they 
would  go  on  to  the  theatre  afterwards.  Aubert  was  the  first  man 
Whistler  knew  in  Paris,  the  friend  who  helped  him  to  find  his 
1900]  91 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

first  rooms.  Henri  Martin,  he  thinks,  must  be  the  son  of  the  his 
torian,  who  did  a  little  painting.  The  man  in  Soupe  a  Trois  Sous 
was  another  Martin,  a  soldier,  given  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of 
Honour  at  sixteen  for  bravery  in  1848.  He  planted  a  flag  on  the 
top  of  a  barricade.  He  was  the  youngest  man  who  ever  received 
the  Cross.  Afterwards  it  was  taken  from  him  for  misconduct. 
Whistler  was  always  ready  for  a  quarrel,  or  rather  to  defend  him 
self — as  in  the  case  of  Legros — un  petit  rageur,  even  as  a  student. 
Then  a  story  of  another  artist  with  a  studio  at  the  Rue  Campagne- 
Premiere  who  came  to  Drouet  one  day  about  noon,  looking  miser 
able,  wrapped  in  his  coat,  the  collar  turned  up,  and  asked  Drouet 
to  help  him  out  of  a  scrape.  He  had  been  to  the  Bal  Bullier  the 
night  before,  and  there  met  with  a  wonderful  creature,  the  model 
who  posed  for  La  Baigneuse  of  Courbet,  a  splendid  creature,  but 
enormous.  And  he  was  with  her  all  evening  and  kept  telling 
people  she  was  La  Baigneuse  de  Courbet,  and  he  brought  her  home, 
and  she  spent  the  night  with  him.  But  in  the  morning,  degrise,  it 
was  another  matter,  and  he  did  not  know  how  to  get  rid  of  her. 
She  was  in  a  most  extraordinary  costume,  a  UEcossaise,  huge  in 
her  red  and  white  stockings  below  her  knees,  her  short  skirts,  and 
her  absurd  little  hat  perched  on  her  head  with  a  feather  sticking 
up  in  the  air,  and  he  was  ashamed  to  see  her  go  across  the  court, 
or  to  be  seen  with  her.  At  last  he  decided  to  fetch  a  cab  into  the 
court  and  drive  her  out  of  sight.  But,  as  she  waited  for  him  she 
leaned  out  of  his  window,  neighbors  got  wind  of  something  unusual, 
when  the  cab  rattled  in,  they  were  all  at  their  windows,  and  her 
going  was  an  enormous  sensation. 

Another  story  was  of  the  old  man  whom  Whistler  painted  with  a 
pipe  in  his  mouth,  the  picture  Drouet  has.  Whistler  picked  him 
up  in  the  Halles,  un  miserable  without  a  sou  to  buy  himself  food, 
but  with  a  curious  hat  and  a  face  full  of  character,  and  Whistler 
told  him  if  he  would  come  to  the  studio  and  be  painted,  he  could 
earn  forty  sous.  And  the  old  man  said  Bien,  but  first  he  must  get 
his  voiture,  and  Whistler  wondered  how  a  man  who  hadn't  a  sou 
for  a  dinner  could  keep  a  carriage.  When  they  got  outside,  there 
it  was:  a  push  cart  full  of  pots-de-chambre.  And  off  they  went, 
92  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

and  the  voiture  with  its  crockery  was  left  in  the  court,  and  he  sat 
for  two  or  three  hours,  and  he  sang  funny  old  songs  to  Whistler 
who  began  to  sing  them  with  him,  and  they  were  great  friends. 
Freer  wanted  the  painting,  but  would  not  give  Drouet  two  thou 
sand  francs  for  it.  Now  no  one  shall  have  it  for  less  than  two 
thousand,  five  hundred.  [Drouet  left  it  to  the  Louvre.]  Drouet 
sat  twice  for  his  etching — one  day  for  two  and  a  half  hours,  the 
next  for  one  and  a  half.  The  Bibi  Valentin  was  done  in  a  couple 
of  sittings  also — about  five  hours  in  all.  Another  touch  to  the  story 
of  Mere  Gerard.  When  she  said  encore  une  espece  de  canaille  de 
moins,  Whistler  laughed  and  then  she  recognized  him  though  she 
couldn't  see  him — his  laugh  was  known  even  then.  When  Whistler 
left  Paris,  he  owed  Lalouette  three  thousand  francs.  It  was  an 
awful  business  paying  it,  but  he  paid  it  in  the  end.  A  picture 
Drouet  remembers  his  painting  was  the  portrait  of  a  big  English 
man  who  was  copying  a  picture  of  Angelica  Kauffmann's  in  the 
Louvre.  What  has  become  of  the  portrait  he  cannot  say. 
The  stories  about  Oulevey  were  inexhaustible.  When  he  moved 
into  new  quarters,  with  no  furniture  except  an  easel  and  a  chair 
or  two,  the  landlord  objected  to  a  tenant  without  furniture.  At 
that  time,  pianos  could  be  hired  for  about  seven  francs  a  month. 
Oulevey  hired  one.  It  came,  made  a  great  effect  in  the  house,  and 
the  landlord  was  reassured.  [A  piano  later  saved  Whistler  from 
his  creditors.  Nor  was  this  merely  a  version  of  the  Oulevey  adven 
ture  with  Whistler's  name  substituted.  We  have  the  piano  people's 
bill  presented  for  payment  of  rent  to  the  bankruptcy  commis 
sioners.]  Sometimes  when  Oulevey  was  two  or  three  months  behind 
in  the  rent,  an  old  man  and  good  friend,  le  Pere  Perret,  would  come 
round,  make  some  excuse  to  sit  with  the  concierge,  and  presently 
begin  to  talk  of  Oulevey  and  what  a  talented  fellow  he  was.  "Yes, 
all  very  well,  but  he  doesn't  pay  his  rent  which  is  much  more 
important,"  the  concierge  thought.  Bah!  was  the  Pere  Perret's 
answer,  that  was  all  right,  he  had  an  order  for  a  five  hundred  francs 
picture,  and  would  be  less  than  a  fortnight  painting  it.  And  the 
Pere  Perret  would  go  up  to  see  Oulevey  and,  on  the  stairs  coming 
down  would  call  out,  "And  now,  mon  gar f on,  you  know  you  must 
1900]  93 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

get  to  work  and  paint  your  picture."  And  the  concierge  would  tell 
the  landlord,  "Better  let  him  stay  on,  he  will  have  five  hundred 
francs  in  a  fortnight,  and  then  he  can  pay.  If  we  turn  him  out  now, 
he  can't."  A  time  came  when  the  landlord  wouldn't  keep  him 
any  longer,  and  everything  was  to  be  seized.  Oulevey  wanted  to 
get  his  canvases  away.  He  tore  them  off  the  stretchers  and  made 
a  great  roll  of  them.  One  day,  when  he  was  out,  a  friend  came 
with  a  roll  just  like  it  on  his  shoulder,  and  Oulevey's  key  in  his 
pocket,  and  lingered  a  moment  with  the  concierge  to  make  sure 
the  roll  on  his  shoulder  was  seen.  He  climbed  to  Oulevey's  studio, 
changed  the  rolls,  returned  with  the  canvases  on  his  shoulder, 
and  again  stopped  to  let  the  concierge  know  that  he  hadn't  found 
M.  Oulevey  and  couldn't  get  into  the  studio.  In  the  Louvre,  it 
was  the  same.  Oulevey  was  forever  playing  practical  jokes.  When 
a  young  lady,  working  next  to  him  on  a  high  scaffold  copying  a 
popular  Murillo,  had  carefully  prepared  her  palette  and  was  about 
to  begin  to  paint,  he  would  give  an  accidental  push  to  the  steps 
of  the  scaffold,  and  the  stroke  would  be  made  in  the  air.  Or  he 
brought  carrots,  turnips  and  potatoes,  and  while  she  was  at  lunch 
hid  them  on  the  steps  so  that  when  she  came  back,  at  the  first 
touch,  they  rattled  down  all  about  her,  rolled  over  the  floor.  One 
day  she  felt  she  couldn't  stand  it  any  longer  and  meeting  him  at 
the  lunch  hour  in  the  Rue  de  Rivoli,  she  stopped  him  to  say  she 
must  complain  to  the  authorities.  But  pardon,  he  said,  he  did 
not  understand  what  she  was  talking  about,  he  did  not  paint  in 
the  Louvre — that  must  be  his  brother — then  he  tore  back  as  fast 
as  he  could  and  was  in  his  place,  painting,  when  she  got  there. 
She  had  never  seen  such  an  extraordinary  resemblance,  she  mar 
velled,  and  forgot  to  complain.  He  loved  les  charges — was  a  great 
blagueur.  It  was  the  day  when  artists  still  delighted  in  practical 
jokes — even  Courbet  played  them. 

Drouet  remembers  seeing  Whistler  in  Paris  in  1862,  breakfasting 
with  him  in  his  studio,  and  Whistler  cooking  the  breakfast  over  a 
little  stove  in  the  middle  of  the  studio.  His  impression  is  that 
Whistler  did  not  work  in  the  schools — did  not  work  in  Paris.  He 
danced  in  the  evening,  went  to  bed  late,  never  got  up  till  towards 
94  [1900 


EARLY  PARIS  MEMORIES 

noon.  But  he  would  have  done  more  had  he  stayed  in  France — 
where  there  were  artists  to  rival:  in  England  there  was  no  one. 
However,  all  his  great  pictures,  beginning  with  At  the  Piano,  were 
done  in  England.  He  thinks  Whistler  soon  lost  his  power — either 
from  alcoholism  or  women — which  is  absurd.  Thought  he  never 
did  prints  of  any  account  after  he  went  to  Venice.  He  drew  freely 
at  first.  But,  whether  from  alcohol  or  not,  his  hand  weakened,  he 
had  to  rest  his  wrist  on  something  while  he  worked,  could  only 
make  a  few  strokes  at  a  time.  This  was  the  reason  of  the  change 
of  method  in  the  Venice  plates.  They  had  no  real  value.  It  was 
fictitious,  made  by  dealers  who  couldn't  get  hold  of  the  early  ones. 
He  ought  to  have  stayed  in  Paris  where  there  were  painters  he 
could  compete  with — there  were  none  in  London. 
Whistler  was  always  unwilling  to  tell  his  age — only  two  or  three 
years  before  his  death,  once  in  Drouet's  rooms,  Drouet  asked  him 
how  old  he  was.  He  fumbled  with  his  eyeglass  and  said,  about 
fifty-eight  or  fifty-nine,  yes,  that  must  be  it,  all  the  time  looking 
out  of  the  corner  of  his  eye  to  see  if  Drouet  took  it  in.  He  never 
gave  anything  much  to  Drouet,  though  Drouet  gave  him  many 
things;  he  was  un  pen  egoiste,  un  enfant  gate.  He  hated  to  be  alone. 
Those  last  years  in  Paris  he  always  drove  everywhere,  couldn't 
walk  in  his  little,  tight  shoes.  You  would  see  him  in  cabs,  fast 
asleep.  One  night  he  was  going  to  dine  with  a  friend.  It  was  cold 
and  he  took  a  cab,  with  a  chauffrette.  Got  in,  couldn't  find  it 
anywhere.  Then  he  saw  that  the  cocker  had  it  under  his  own  feet. 
When  Whistler  got  out,  he  paid  his  fare — it  was  before  the  taxi- 
metre — exactly  thirty  sous  and  no  more,  and  the  drive  had  been 
long.  "And  the  pour-boire?"  the  cocker  asked,  and  his  language 
was  awful.  "Inside  on  the  chauffrette"  Whistler  said,  so  pleased 
that  he  was  in  wonderful  spirits  all  evening.  The  friend  he  dined 
with  had  never  seen  him  so  gay.  Drouet  said  there  were  always 
histories  with  the  cocker  when  Whistler  came  to  see  him.  Whistler 
would  never  pay  enough.  At  last  Drouet  said  to  his  bonne,  just 
to  pay  it  always,  and  be  done  with  it. 

Drouet,  unlike  Oulevey,  says  that  Whistler  didn't  print  his  etchings 
in  Paris,  Delatre  printed  them  all.  Whistler  stood  by  his  side  and 
1900]  95 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

watched  the  printing  of  every  one;  that  was  how  he  learned  to  print. 
Drouet  and  he  were  looking  over  Rembrandt's  etchings  together 
once  in  Drouet's  rooms,  and  Drouet  told  Whistler  he  was  the  first 
etcher  since  Rembrandt  and  pointed  out  where  their  work  was 
alike.  And  Whistler  was  deeply  moved — "si  vous  le  pensez,  mon 
cher"  he  said,  "fa  me  donne  grand  plaisir." 

Drouet's  stories,  not  always  exact  and  sometimes  flamboyant, 
showed  a  tendency  to  greater  flamboyancy  as  the  evening  went  on. 
Whether  or  no  they  alarmed  Keppel,  after  one  more  than  usually 
lurid,  he  abruptly  said  good-night,  the  first  of  the  party  to  go. 
Drouet  and  Duret,  having  complained  of  a  courant  d'air,  we  had 
pulled  the  table  from  the  middle  of  the  low  room  to  one  side,  and 
Keppel  was  sitting  directly  under  the  electric  light.  He  got  up 
from  his  chair  so  suddenly  that  he  struck  his  head  hard  against 
the  sharp  end  of  the  bulb.  Blood  streamed  down  his  face.  For  a 
moment  it  looked  serious,  a  sensational  tale  for  Drouet  to  add  to 
his  list.  But  the  wound,  when  examined,  proved  a  scratch.  The 
blood  was  staunched  and  he  was  able  to  drive  home  alone,  which 
was  fortunate  as  our  other  two  guests  showed  no  signs  of  going. 
Duret  stayed  until  midnight,  Drouet  an  hour  later.  J.  looked  ready 
to  drop.  I  was  all  but  stifled  from  the  atmosphere  of  the  room  so 
carefully  protected  from  any  courant  d'air.  Wonderful  the  old  men 
of  Whistler's  generation,  so  much  younger  than  the  young  of  to-day. 

CHAPTER  VIII:  THE  LEYLANDS— THEIR  CIRCLE, 
AND  THE  PEACOCK  ROOM.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Monday,  July  i6th,  1900.  Whistler  came  to  dinner.  A  fearfully 
hot  evening — the  heat  quite  American — and  he  arrived  in  a  broad- 
brimmed  grey  felt  hat  on  one  side  of  his  curls,  a  cross  between  the 
Rough  Riders'  and  a  Henry  Heath  hat. 

He  was  in  a  reminiscent  mood,  though  he  had  first  to  tell  us  of 
Kennedy.  "I  had  not  liked  Kennedy's  saying  that  my  sending 
him  clippings  of  the  Irishmen's  reverses  in  South  Africa  was  in 
poor  taste.  And  so,  you  know,  I  went  to  his  room,  while  he  was 
96  [1900 


F.  R.  LEYLAND 

ETCHING.  M.   IO2 


i  i 


SKETCH  OP  LEYLAND 

OIL 

In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  F.  R.  Leyland 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

in  the  midst  of  his  trunks  and  things  this  morning,  and  told  him  so. 
And  Kennedy  was  splendid  and  said  how  much  he  regretted  having 
offended  me  and  that  he  would  write  and  tell  you,  and  we  shook 
hands  on  it,  and  parted  greater  friends  than  ever."  His  reminis 
cences  began  with  X.,  who  was  asked  once  to  stay  over  night  in 
the  house  in  Chelsea,  because  of  rain,  and  stayed  three  years. 
"Well,  you  know,  there  he  was,  and  that  was  the  way  he  had 
always  lived — the  prince  of  parasites!  I  met  him  first  at  the 
Leylands — an  extraordinary  household.  Leyland  was  playing  the 
Liverpool  Medicis — he  was  interested  in  art — he  would  come  home 
from  his  office,  go  upstairs  to  his  room  without  speaking  to  anyone, 
shut  himself  in,  and  play  on  the  piano,  practising  and  practising. 
Then,  perhaps,  he  would  go  downstairs  to  the  drawing-room  where 
Mrs.  Leyland  was  with  X.  and  his  two  sisters  and  other  hangers-on, 
and  he  would  make  a  scene  with  her — he  was  always  making 
scenes  with  her,  so  that  when  he  was  away  she  was  always  having 
little  parties  and  supper  parties,  and  he  would  come  home  and 
catch  her  in  the  middle  of  supper  sometimes.  X.  was  the  profes 
sional  hanger-on,  drifting  from  one  house  to  another.  He  was  a 
genius,  a  musician;  that  was  why  Leyland  kept  him  for  so  long. 
He  was  supposed  not  to  know  his  notes,  and  for  that  to  be  all  the 
more  wonderful.  He  was  really  the  first  of  the  Aesthetes,  before 
the  silly  name  was  invented.  He  hadn't  anything  to  do  while  he 
was  with  me,  he  didn't  do  anything  but  decorate  the  dinner  table, 
arrange  the  flowers,  then  play  the  piano  and  talk.  He  hadn't  any 
enthusiasms,  that's  why  he  was  so  restful.  I  never  saw  him  until 
I  came  out  of  my  studio  in  the  afternoon,  and  there  would  be  dinner, 
and  there  he  was  ready  to  talk  and  be  amiable.  He  was  always 
ready  to  go  to  Cremorne  with  me.  At  moments,  my  Mother,  and 
you  can  just  imagine  the  strict,  correct  old  Southern  lady,  fresh 
from  New  England,  objected  to  such  a  loafer  about  the  house. 
And  I  would  say  to  her,  'Well,  but  my  dear  Mummy,  who  else  is 
there  to  whom  one  could  say,  Play,  and  he  would  play,  and,  Stop 
playing,  and  he  would  stop  right  away!'  Part  of  the  time  X.  spent 
with  the  Greaves,  the  boat  people,  a  sort  of  Peggotty  family,  playing 
with  Tinnie  Greaves.  The  two  brothers  were  my  first  pupils. 
1900]  97 

7 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

And  that  was  about  all  he  did,  except  drink  my  whiskey.  I  remon 
strated  once,  but  he  said,  What  could  he  do?  He  belonged  to  a 
thirsty  family,  a  family  that  needed  whiskey.  His  mother  was 
always  thirsty  too.  Then,  I  was  ill,  and  he  was  no  use  at  all.  He 
couldn't  be  trusted  with  a  message  to  the  doctor  or  the  chemist, 
and  he  was  only  in  the  way.  But  he  had  the  good  sense  to  see  it 
and  to  suggest  it  was  time  to  be  going,  and  he  left  for  somebody 
else!  And  he  drifted  and  drifted,  until  one  day  an  old  Polish  lady 
saw  him  on  the  pier  at  Brighton,  or  some  place,  and  took  a  fancy 
to  him.  And  he  went  to  live  with  her,  and  she  made  him  her  heir, 
and  they  went  to  Paris  together.  But  his  thirst  was  still  strong, 
and  he  died  before  she  did.  His  friends  even  dressed  him  half 
the  time.  When  he  was  with  me  he  pointed  once  to  his  shoes,  all 
broken  and  cracked.  I  said,  'Yes,  they  are  rather  bad,  but  I  don't 
mind.'  'No,'  said  X.,  'but  I  think  I  should  have  another  pair 
because  of  John,'  my  man  servant.  Yes,  you  know,  the  real  para 
site,  and  it  never  occurred  to  him  that  there  was  any  reason  why 
he  should  not  live  like  that." 

The  Greaves  brothers  afterwards  made  a  great  excitement  by 
painting  the  Town  Hall  at  Streatham.  Trixie  went  down  to  see 
it  when  we  were  staying  at  Long's  Hotel  and  the  walls  were  covered 
with  nocturnes  and  things.  Then  he  went  on  to  The  Peacock 
Room.  "I  had  got  to  such  a  point  in  the  work,  putting  in  every 
touch  with  a  freedom  that  was  wonderful,  so  much  so,  that  when 
I  got  round  to  the  corner  where  I  had  started,  I  painted  a  bit  of 
it  over  again  that  the  difference  should  not  be  seen.  I  just  painted 
it  as  I  went  on,  without  design  or  sketch." 

The  garden — the  Embankment  Gardens  below  our  windows — 
struck  him  especially.  After  all,  why  should  we  want  to  go  away, 
with  the  river  there,  and  the  garden  gay  with  people  and  with 
music,  even  if  it  was  bad.  And,  for  the  first  time,  he  complained 
of  the  heat.  He  liked  it,  but  it  made  him  restless. 

Frederick  Leyland  was  one  of  the  rare  modern  collectors  with  the 
sense  to  collect  modern  work  and  the  discrimination  to  commission 
the  most  distinguished  artists  of  his  time  to  decorate  his  house 
and  to  paint,  draw  and  etch  himself  and  his  family.  He  and  Mrs. 
98  [1900 


FLORENCE  LEYLAND 

DRY-POINT.  M.  1 10 


ELINOR  LEYLAND 

DRY-POINT.   M.    109 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

Leyland,  their  three  daughters  and  their  son  will  live  in  Whistler's 
portraits  as  Philip  IV  and  his  family  live  in  the  portraits  by  Velas 
quez.  Other  contemporary  collectors  are  forgotten  but  Leyland 
is  remembered  and  he  owes  it  to  Whistler.  The  Fricks  and  the 
Johnsons  and  that  type  of  collector  may  hope,  by  buying  dealer- 
boomed  Old  Masters  at  huge  prices  and  ignoring  the  art  of  the 
present  to  buy  immortality  for  themselves.  But  who  to-day 
knows  anything  about  the  personality  of  Altman,  or  J.  P.  Morgan? 
In  twenty  years  neither  will  be  heard  of  because  they  bought  only 
the  things  of  the  past,  while  the  Six  family  and  the  Medicis  family 
live  because  they  collected  the  work  of  their  contemporaries, 
though  the  Medicis  could  interest  themselves  too  in  the  re-dis 
covered  treasures  of  earlier  ages  which,  in  their  day,  were  becoming 
a  collector's  fad.  The  stupidity  of  the  average  American  collector, 
however,  is  equalled  only  by  his  money,  and  before  long  his  collec 
tions  will  be  sold  for  the  benefit  of  his  family  or  dispersed  by  the 
proletariat,  as  is  happening  now  in  Europe.  And  before  that  even 
his  name  will  be  forgotten. 

Leyland,  the  great  shipowner,  one  of  the  wealthiest  and  most 
influential  men  in  Liverpool,  was  as  extraordinary  as  Whistler 
called  him.  He  was  entirely  a  self-made  man.  The  career  of  many 
of  our  self-made  magnates  would  seem  commonplace  in  comparison 
to  his.  He  began  at  the  lowest  rung  of  the  ladder  and  not  only 
climbed  to  the  highest,  but  got  there  with  a  distinction  and  accom 
plishment  seldom  equalled  by  the  University-made  snob  who  looks 
down  upon  anyone  not  born  and  bred  according  to  his  standards. 
Mrs.  W.  J.  Stillman,  in  a  talk  about  Whistler  with  E.,  said: — 

November  ijth,  1906.  Leyland's  mother  was  a  poor  woman  who 
sold  pies  in  the  streets  of  Liverpool  and  Bibby,  the  rich  shipping 
man,  sometimes  bought  her  pies  and  found  them  good.  And  he 
used  to  talk  to  her.  Once  he  asked  her  what  she  was  going  to  do 
with  her  son  and,  as  her  plans  for  him  were  vague,  took  the  boy 
to  sweep  out  his  office  and  run  his  errands.  That  was  the  beginning 
and  yet  Leyland,  like  old  lonides,  knew  what  was  good  in  art  and 
was,  moreover,  a  fine  musician. 

With  his  talent  for  music  we  have  nothing  to  do.  Apparently  it 
was  a  genuine  talent,  but  it  amused  Whistler.  He  thought  Leyland 
portentously  solemn  and  serious  over  it  and  nothing  pleased  him 
more  than  the  comment  of  a  chance  workman  about  the  house  who, 
hearing  Leyland  practising  his  scales  for  hours,  thought  "he  must 
1900]  99 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

be  such  a  light-hearted  gentleman!"  But  in  art  Leyland  knew 
well  enough  what  was  good  to  become  Whistler's  patron  at  a  time 
when  purchasers  of  Whistler's  paintings  and  prints  were  few. 
From  Leyland,  Whistler  received  innumerable  commissions  to 
which  the  end  was  not  in  sight  when  he  began  the  decoration  of 
The  Peacock  Room,  and  the  commissions  brought  about  a  close 
friendship  between  him  and  the  Leyland  family.  Leyland  approved 
of  him  as  much  as  of  his  art;  the  children  delighted  in  him;  for  a 
while  he  was  engaged  to  Mrs.  Leyland's  sister;  the  gossip  of  the 
day  was  inclined  to  believe  him  in  love  with  Mrs.  Leyland.  What 
with  their  friendship  and  what  with  the  work  that  took  him  to 
Speke  Hall  and  the  London  house  in  Princes  Gate — "a  never- 
ending  guest"  as  he  put  it — he  was  so  closely  associated  with  them 
that  the  quarrel  disorganized  his  life  as  disastrously  as  his  finances. 
He  said  more  than  once  that  The  Peacock  Room  was  the  reason 
of  his  bankruptcy — "Ever  since,  I've  had  no  luck,"  or,  in  the 
face  of  another  writ  or  bailiff,  "All  this  annoyance  is  the  result  of 
that  confounded  Peacock  Room  where  I  had  no  'business  con 
tract.'"  Not  many  people  are  left  who  knew  both  Leyland  and 
Whistler  in  the  years  of  their  friendship.  We  were  just  in  time 
when  we  began  the  Life.  Never  again  can  the  facts  and  contem 
porary  rumours  and  opinions  be  collected,  as  we  collected  them, 
at  first  hand.  Some  we  did  not  use,  thinking  them  inappropriate 
in  a  biography,  others  we  obtained  only  after  the  Life  was  pub 
lished.  But  they  should  not  be  lost,  and  at  this  date  we  can  write 
with  greater  freedom.  Besides,  they  help  to  a  fuller  understanding 
of  Whistler.  Too  much  cannot  be  known  of  the  world's  great  men. 
We  never  saw  Leyland  who  died  in  the  early  Nineties.  But  E. 
met  Mrs.  Leyland  as  our  work  on  the  book  progressed  and  she  was 
keen  to  tell  all  she  could,  keen  to  talk  of  Whistler  who,  there  is  no 
doubt,  then  occupied  as  prominent  a  place  in  her  memory  as  of 
old  he  had  in  her  life.  The  notes  made  of  E.'s  three  visits  are  of 
interest — "human  documents"  would  have  been  the  name  for 
them  in  the  Eighties  and  Nineties — and  we  therefore  give  them, 
with  occasional  omissions,  as  they  are  in  The  Whistler  Journal. 
The  first  visit  was  on 

October  26th,  1906.  Went  by  appointment  to  call  on  Mrs.  Leyland. 
Found  her  sitting  in  her  drawing-room  with  a  cat  on  her  lap;  an 
old,  much-wrinkled  woman,  short,  slight,  still  pretty  with  a  becom 
ing  white  wig,  in  a  tight-fitting  black  lace  gown  and  many  pearls 
and  diamonds,  her  figure  as  slight  and  trig  as  a  young  girl's.  She 
100  [1900 


THE  PEACOCK  ROOM 

From  a  photograph  made  while  it  was  in  place  in  Princes  Gate,  showing  blue-and  white  on  the  walls 
Photograph  in  Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


RICH  AND  POOR  PEACOCKS 

In  Peacock  Room.     Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 
(See  page  108) 


MRS.  LEYLAND.    THE  VELVET  DRESS 

DRY-POINT.  M.   IOS 


(See  page  702) 


STUDIES  OF  MRS.  LEYLAND'S  DRESS.     BLACK  AND  WHITE   CHALK 

In  the  possession  of  Walter  S.  Brewster,  Esq.  and  Mrs.  Knowles 
(See  page  301} 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

talked  for  fifteen  minutes  or  so  about  the  cat,  a  quite  homely, 
almost  a  gutter  cat,  and  when  I  was  wondering  how  I  could  bring 
in  Whistler,  she  suddenly  said  that  cats  had  such  charm  and  were 
so  graceful  that  they  appealed  to  Whistler  who  always  liked  every 
thing  charming  and  graceful. 

She  told  me  it  was  through  Rossetti  they  first  knew  him,  Rossetti 
introduced  him  to  Leyland  who  bought  La  Princesse  du  Pays  de  la 
Porcelaine,  and  they  at  once  became  great  friends.  In  those  days 
the  Leylands  had  no  house  in  London,  they  stayed  at  the  Alexandra 
Hotel  when  they  came  to  town,  but  Whistler  and  his  mother  used 
to  spend  months  with  them  at  Speke  Hall.  All  the  family  sat  for 
him:  Leyland,  herself,  her  three  daughters,  her  son;  Leyland  paid 
him  for  all  the  portraits,  but  not  one  was  completely  finished.  He 
would  work  on  them  in  the  Lindsey  Row  house  and  then  take  the 
canvases  up  to  Speke  Hall  and  work  on  them  there.  Her  children 
were  awfully  good  about  it,  though  they  got  fearfully  tired.  The 
son,  after  three  sittings,  wouldn't  sit  again.  She  herself  didn't 
mind,  she  didn't  get  tired,  and  she  knew  Whistler  liked  to  have 
her  stand  because  he  always  talked  to  her  freely,  told  her  all  his 
troubles  and  looked  for  her  sympathy.  When  she  was  in  London, 
and  Leyland  had  to  stay  in  Liverpool,  Whistler  would  come  and 
take  her  about;  one  had  to  have  a  man  when  one  went  out  in 
London.  She  remembered  his  going  with  her  to  her  box  at  the 
Opera,  and  the  attendant  who  opened  the  door  and  helped  them 
with  their  wraps,  when  he  took  Whistler's  hat,  leaned  over  and 
said,  "I  beg  your  pardon,  Sir,  but  there  is  a  white  feather  in  your 
hair,  just  on  top."  People  talked  about  her  and  Whistler,  went 
so  far  as  to  say  she  was  going  to  elope  with  him,  which  was 
absurd,  as  if  she  would!  Though  she  didn't  say  that  if  she  had 
been  a  widow  then  she  mightn't  have  married  him.  Whistler  was 
engaged  for  a  while  to  her  youngest  sister,  who  was  pretty,  but 
not  the  wife  for  him,  and  it  was  a  good  thing  the  engagement  was 
broken,  though  she  always  thought  that  if  he  had  married  early 
the  right  sort  of  woman  it  would  have  made  the  difference. 
He  designed  the  dress  in  her  portrait,  white  and  rose  chiffon  with 
rosettes  scattered  here  and  there,  and  when  she  could  not  come, 
1900]  101 


'TiiE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

sometimes  Maud  posed  in  it  so  he  could  paint  the  draperies.  The 
pose  was  one  natural  to  her,  one  she  took  unconsciously  when  she 
stood  talking.  She  had  never  known  an  artist  to  be  more  conscien 
tious — the  picture  was  rubbed  out  again  and  again;  there  were  times 
when  after  a  day's  work,  it  looked  as  if  it  were  really  all  but  finished 
and  she  thought  not  more  than  another  sitting  was  needed,  and 
the  next  morning  she  would  come  to  find  the  whole  thing  rubbed 
down,  and  the  work  to  begin  all  over.  The  portrait  of  Mrs.  Huth 
was  painted  while  she  was  sitting  for  hers  in  the  Chelsea  house, 
and  she  pretended  to  be  indignant  with  him  because  she  wanted 
to  wear  just  such  a  black  velvet  dress  as  Mrs.  Huth  wore  and  he 
insisted  on  her  wearing  the  one  he  designed.  He  began  a  big 
picture  for  Leyland,  girls  and  flowers,  but  never  finished  it. 
When  he  gave  his  first  dinner  party  at  Lindsey  Row,  she  lent  him 
her  butler  and  in  the  afternoon  she  and  her  sister  went  round  to 
see  if  everything  was  in  order,  and  they  hung  up  white  muslin 
curtains  at  the  windows  for  him.  It  was  a  big  dinner  party  and 
there  were  interesting  people,  and  one  absurd  incident  she  remem 
bered.  A  woman  neither  she  nor  Whistler  liked  came  in  a  white 
muslin  slip  over  a  pink  slip,  and,  being  near  sighted,  mistook  a 
sort  of  Japanese  bath  filled  with  water  and  water-lilies  for  a  divan 
and  was  about  to  sit  in  it  when  Mrs.  Leyland  rescued  her,  and 
Whistler  said  afterwards,  why  did  she?  A  daughter  of  Grisi's  was 
there,  and  Whistler  made  Leyland  take  her  in  to  dinner  because 
he  thought  she  must  be  musical,  and  the  first  thing  she  said  when 
they  sat  down  was,  Did  he  like  Ouida's  novels?  Of  course  they 
went  to  many  of  the  breakfasts,  but  she  had  not  much  to  say 
about  them. 

In  the  end,  she  thought  Whistler  behaved  badly  to  Leyland. 
Leyland  only  meant  him  to  decorate  the  shelves  Jekyll  designed 
to  hold  the  blue-and-white  china,  and  he  passed  over  the  loss  of 
his  old  leather  and  being  kept  out  of  his  house  for  so  long.  He  was 
not  only  a  generous,  but  a  just  man,  and  he  thought  Whistler 
asked  him  too  much  for  the  decoration.  If  she  remembered  it 
was  three  thousand  guineas,  something  between  two  and  three 
thousand.  She  herself  never  quarrelled  with  Whistler,  though  she 
102  [1900 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

objected  to  something  she  heard  him  say  in  The  Peacock  Room 
about  her  husband.  But  she  saw  him  afterwards,  she  went  to 
his  house  and  he  came  to  see  her.  Her  oldest  daughter,  however, 
seemed  to  think  it  was  better  not  to,  and  so  in  the  end,  for  some 
years  before  his  marriage  and  until  his  death,  they  had  not  met. 
She  sent  him  a  message  once,  to  come  and  bring  his  wife,  through 
Mrs.  Alan  Cole,  and  Mrs.  Whistler,  who  seemed  a  jealous  person, 
resented  it  and  asked  Mrs.  Cole  how  she  could  want  to  break  up 
the  peace  of  a  happy  home.  She  could  not  understand  his  will. 
She  thought  he  ought  to  have  left  something  to  his  son.  He  had 
taken  her  to  see  the  son  once  when  he  was  a  small  boy. 
It  was  her  nocturne  that  was  brought  into  court  in  the  place  of 
Mrs.  Wyndham's,  which  she  insists  was  the  one  Ruskin  wrote 
about.  Mrs.  Wyndham  was  away,  and  hers  was  sent  down  from 
Speke  Hall,  and  she  was  furious  because  it  was  taken  into  court 
without  the  frame,  and  the  frame  was  painted  by  Whistler — with 
blue  waves,  carrying  out  and  completing  the  design.  It  got  so 
battered  afterwards  she  had  it  gilded  over.  It  hangs  in  her  drawing 
room:  a  beautiful  blue  night,  a  great  wide  stretch  of  river,  the 
factory  chimneys  and  church  tower  of  Battersea  on  the  far  shore, 
and  in  the  foreground  a  spray  of  foliage  and  the  Butterfly  in  the 
long  narrow  Japanesish  panel.  She  says  it  was  Leyland  who  sug 
gested  to  him  the  names  Symphony  and  Harmony.  There  are 
dreadful  pictures  near  it  in  the  drawing-room  and  a  lot  of  photo 
graphs  of  people,  and  one  of  a  gravestone  in  a  cemetery.  Down 
stairs  in  the  dining-room,  where  she  took  me,  Whistler's  portrait 
hangs  side  by  side  with  a  big  full-length  portrait  of  her  by  Phil 
Morris,  a  portrait  of  Mrs.  Prinsep  by  Val  Prinsep  on  one  side,  and 
opposite  another  of  Prinsep's  pictures.  I  could  hardly  see  the 
Whistler  in  the  late  afternoon  light,  so  I  lost  the  colour.  The  pose 
is  charming.  The  portrait  belongs  to  her  son,  but  she  is  to  keep 
it  as  long  as  she  lives.  The  Nocturne  is  hers  and  she  will  not  part 
with  it.  An  American  had  come  to  her  anxious  to  buy  both.  In 
her  bedroom  are  three  pastels  of  the  children:  the  boy  with  a 
wide-brimmed  hat  on  the  back  of  his  head,  his  legs  crossed  and 
stretched  out  in  a  graceful  pose;  one  little  girl,  Mrs.  Prinsep,  stand- 
1900]  103 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

ing  in  old-fashioned  dress,  wearing  hat  and  jacket;  and  the  other, 
the  youngest,  lounging  in  a  chair.  In  the  back  drawing-room  and 
in  the  morning-room  are  etchings  of  The  French  Set  and  other  early 
ones  of  that  date,  and  of  The  Thames  Set.  She  is  willing  to  let  us 
photograph  anything  she  has,  provided  the  pictures  are  not  taken 
from  the  house.  At  the  time  of  the  sale  of  her  husband's  things, 
she  says  Whistler  wrote  her  from  Paris  protesting  against  the  sale 
of  certain  sketches  of  herself  and  the  children,  which  he  said  were 
hers  and  not  Leyland's.  He  had  given  them  to  her,  Leyland  had 
not  bought  them. 

The  second  note  is  dated  a  month  later  the  same  year: — 

December  I2th.  I  called  on  Mrs.  Leyland.  She  evidently  likes  to 
talk  Whistler.  She  told  me  virtually  the  things  she  told  me  the 
last  time  I  saw  her,  with  a  few  additions.  When  she  went  to  sit 
for  her  portrait  in  the  Lindsey  Row  house,  she  used  to  meet 
Carlyle  who  was  sitting  for  his.  He  was  grumpy,  in  the  end 
wouldn't  come  as  often  as  Whistler  wanted.  Phil  Morris' 
father  had  to  sit  for  the  coat.  Then,  it  was  Rossetti  who  told  her 
of  the  report  that  she  was  about  to  elope  with  Whistler.  Not  only 
had  she  gone  with  him  to  see  his  son;  then  a  small  child  in  charge 
of  some  woman  somewhere  in  the  country,  and  Whistler  seemed 
quite  fond  of  him,  taking  him  in  his  arms;  but  she  saw  him  again 
when  he  was  much  older  and  Jo  was  taking  care  of  him.  He  called 
her  "Aunty,"  and  sometimes  he  would  come  to  the  studio  and  say 
that  "Aunty"  wanted  some  money — she  remembered  him  a  little 
lad  in  a  sailor  suit.  He  was  the  son  of  another  model.  Whistler 
always  said  he  was  "an  accident." 

Mrs.  Whistler,  Whistler's  mother,  told  her  a  most  romantic  story 
of  her  marrying  Major  Whistler.  The  Major's  first  wife  had  been 
her  intimate  friend,  with  whom  she  stayed  a  great  deal  in  the  few 
years  of  their  married  life.  And  all  the  while  she  was  in  love  with 
Major  Whistler,  determined  that  she  would  marry  no  other  man. 
And  it  seems  that  the  first  wife,  dying,  said  to  him  that  if  he 
married  a  second  time,  it  must  be  to  Miss  McNeill,  that  is, 
Whistler's  mother. 
104  [1900 


! 


SKETCH  OF  DETAIL  OF  PEACOCK  ROOM 

PEN-AND-INK 


SKETCH  OF  STAIRWAY  AT  LEYLAND'S  HOUSE 
Partially  decorated  by  Whistler 

PEX  AND  PENTCIL 

In  the  possession  ®f  the  Estate  of  Mrs.  Leyland 


«r\ 


SKETCHES  OF  PEACOCK  ROOM 

PEN-AND-INK 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  J.  C.  Gardner 


THE  LEYLANDS  —  THEIR  CIRCLE 

Mrs.  Leyland  thinks  there  could  be  no  greater  contrast  than 
between  Whistler  and  the  Doctor.  Whistler  quick  and  alert,  the 
Doctor  slow  and  deliberate  —  he  would  take  half  an  hour  almost 
to  write  the  simplest  prescription;  Whistler  slight,  the  Doctor 
short  and  heavy.  Whistler's  voice  disturbed  some  people.  She 
remembers  at  an  evening  reception,  Whistler  coming  in  and  being 
heard  at  once,  and  the  man  with  her,  not  knowing  who  it  was, 
grumbled  that  even  genius  could  not  excuse  such  a  voice.  She 
talked  again  of  The  Peacock  Room  and  said  nothing  she  had  not 
said  before,  except  that  for  a  while,  when  he  was  doing  it,  Whistler 
lived  at  Princes  Gate,  Leyland  hoping  that  if  he  did,  he  would 
get  on  faster.  But  it  was  Whistler's  conscientiousness  in  work 
that  made  him  slow.  He  never  minded  how  much  time  or  trouble 
he  took  in  order  to  get  what  he  wanted. 

The  third  and  last  visit  was  just  before  the  book  came  out  —  a 
hurried  visit,  for  E.  was  on  the  point  of  sailing  for  New  York:  — 


October  ifth,  1908.  Called  on  Mrs.  Leyland.  She  has  let  Gray 
photograph  her  portrait  again  for  Heinemann.  I  asked  frer  espe 
cially  about  the  picture  in  the  Brooklyn  Museum,  which  is  cata 
logued  as  a  portrait  of  Florence  Leyland,  and  which  Joseph,  who  has 
just  seen  it,  thinks  a  portrait  of  Maud.  She  had  forgotten  it,  thought 
that  her  children  posed  to  Whistler  only  when  quite  young.  But 
she  asked  Mrs.  Val  Prinsep,  who  says  it  is  her  portrait.  She  stood 
for  it  when  she  was  seventeen  or  eighteen,  and  Mrs.  Leyland's 
description  of  the  dress  and  details  agrees  exactly  with  Joseph's. 
He  is  anxious  to  let  Mr.  Goodyear,  the  Curator  of  the  Museum, 
know  about  it.  Mrs.  Leyland  went  over  the  same  reminiscences 
of  Whistler,  and  regretted  that  he  could  not  have  married  her  —  it 
would  have  been  much  better  for  him,  she  thinks. 

That  Whistler  did  one  day  say  something  which  was  overheard 
and  considered  offensive  by  Mrs.  Leyland,  she  was  not  alone  in 
telling  us.  We  had  the  same  story  from  T.  R.  Way,  though  he 
supposed  that  Mrs.  Leyland  also  quarrelled  with  Whistler  in  con 
sequence.  The  Ways  had  an  excellent  opportunity  of  hearing  the 
gossip  on  the  subject  for  it  was  work  connected  with  The  Peacock 
Room  that  introduced  them  to  Whistler. 
1900]  105 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

September  25th,  1906.  Way  said :  They  had  printed  catalogues  for 
Deschamps,  Durand-Ruel's  London  representative,  and  E.  W. 
Godwin,  knowing  this  and  knowing  Thomas  Way  personally — 
both  were  members  of  the  Hogarth  Club — brought  him  to  Whistler 
who  wanted  to  issue  a  leaflet  about  his  decorations.  Way  had 
bought  a  couple  of  Whistler's  water  colours  and  told  him  so,  and 
Whistler  asked  him  to  the  studio  to  see  his  etchings.  After  this, 
young  Way  too  was  sometimes  there  when  Whistler  was  printing, 
and  often  in  The  Peacock  Room  on  business  about  the  leaflet 
which  is  now  so  rare  a  find  for  the  collector.  His  impression  was 
that  Leyland  did  not  mind  anything  Whistler  did,  not  even  the 
disappearance  of  the  old  leather  on  the  dining-room  walls,  for  he 
knew  he  was  getting  greater  beauty  in  exchange.  But  one  day 
Mrs.  Leyland,  who  was  out  of  town,  came  up  unexpectedly  to  the 
house  and  let  herself  in  by  her  own  key.  The  dining-room  door 
was  open  and  Whistler  was  talking  to  a  group  of  friends.  Some 
thing  was  said  of  Leyland  just  as  she  passed.  Whistler  shrugged 
his  shoulders,  "Well,  you  know,  what  can  you  expect  from  a 
parvenu?"  Mrs.  Leyland  went  in  and  ordered  him  to  leave  the 
house.  Until  then,  he  had  come  and  gone  like  one  of  the  family, 
but  when  he  returned  after  a  day  or  two,  the  servants'  instructions 
were  not  to  admit  him,  and  that  was  the  end. 

This  is  Way's  version.  From  Mrs.  Stillman  also  we  heard  of  the 
indiscreet  remark,  though  she  did  not  attribute  to  it  the  beginning 
of  the  end: — 

November  ijth,  1906.  She  remembered  seeing  Whistler  in  The 
Peacock  Room  at  work  with  his  pupils,  the  Greaves,  and  his  giving 
her  tea  as  if  the  house  were  his.  She  thought  it  was  this,  the  way 
Whistler  behaved  as  if  the  house  belonged  to  him,  issuing  cards  of 
admission,  putting  a  bowl  full  of  them  in  a  prominent  place  at 
Liberty's,  that,  above  all,  infuriated  Leyland.  Then  too  while  he 
was  in  possession  of  Leyland's  house,  Whistler  abused  Leyland  and, 
by  accident,  the  abuse  was  overheard  by  Mrs.  Leyland. 

On  the  other  hand,  Sir  Thomas  Sutherland  assured  us  that  Leyland 
knew  nothing  of  the  wholesale  character  of  the  work  in  his  dining- 
106  [1900 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

room,  and  could  not  forgive  Whistler  when  he  discovered  it.    E.'s 
note  of  her  talk  with  Sutherland  goes  further  into  detail: — 

November  ist,  1906.  Sutherland  knew  Leyland  well.  Their  bus 
iness  brought  them  into  close  relations,  and  he  liked  Leyland 
who  was  an  upright  man  in  affairs  and  he  often  visited  the  Liver 
pool  house.  Then  Leyland  took  the  house  in  London  where  he 
was  at  first  a  stranger  and  cared  for  few  people  except  artists,  in 
whom  he  was  interested  and  whose  work  he  bought.  At  Leyland's 
dinner  table  Sutherland  met  Whistler,  then  the  "tame  cat,"  the 
"cher  ami"  of  the  household,  and  also  Rossetti,  Howell,  and 
various  others.  This  was  the  story  of  The  Peacock  Room,  he 
said,  which  he  found  few  people  gave  correctly.  When  the  blue- 
and-white  china  was  arranged  on  the  shelves  in  the  dining-room 
at  Princes  Gate,  the  beautiful  old  Spanish  leather  on  the  walls 
looked  dull  and  dingy.  To  relieve  this  dulness,  Whistler  was  to 
touch  with  gold  or  colour  the  flowers  in  the  design  and  so  bring 
them  out  again.  The  Leylands  went  back  to  Liverpool,  and 
Whistler  was  left  to  finish,  no  one  else  there  but  a  caretaker. 
The  work  was  tedious  and  Whistler  grew  impatient,  and,  in  his 
impatience,  he  covered  the  walls  with  blue  and  worked  out  a 
design  of  his  own  on  the  blue;  this  without  consulting  the 
Leylands.  At  last,  Leyland  returned.  Whistler  didn't  say  any 
thing  but  rather  kept  out  of  the  way.  Leyland  was  furious.  His 
Spanish  leather  was  ruined,  and,  besides,  he  didn't  like  the 
idea  of  so  much  gold  and  gilding  in  the  decorations;  he  felt  it 
inappropriate,  vain-glorious,  for  a  man  like  himself  who  had  made 
his  own  money.  When  he  saw  Whistler  he  told  him  that  his  dining- 
room  was  ruined  and  Whistler's  time  wasted,  which  was  the  more 
serious  to  Whistler  who  was  then  engaged — one  of  many  times. 
What  did  he  suppose  all  that  was  worth  to  him?  And  Whistler 
said  two  thousand  guineas,  and  Leyland,  who  thought  it  extortion 
ate  anyway,  paid  him  in  pounds.  And  this  was  the  end.  Suther 
land  thought  there  was  no  question  that  Whistler  behaved  badly, 
for  the  Leylands  had  been  good  friends  to  him,  their  house  had 
been  his. 
1900]  107 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Lord  Redesdale  gave  us  his  version  which  agreed  with  Sir  Thomas 
Sutherland's  that  Leyland  was  kept  in  ignorance  of  what  was 
going  on  in  his  house: — 

August  2Oth,  1907.  He  remembered  Whistler  in  The  Peacock 
Room.  He  had  been  in  Scotland  and,  coming  back,  called  at 
Whistler's  in  Lindsey  Row  and  was  told  that  Whistler  was  at 
Princes  Gate,  and  there  he  found  him  on  top  of  a  ladder,  looking 
like  a  little  evil  imp,  a  gnome.  "But  what  are  you  doing?"  Redes- 
dale  asked.  "I  am  doing  the  loveliest  thing  you  ever  saw," 
Whistler  said.  "But  what  of  the  beautiful  old  Spanish  leather? 
And  Leyland?  Have  you  consulted  him?"  "Why  should  I?  lam 
doing  the  most  beautiful  thing  that  has  ever  been  done,  you  know, 
the  most  beautiful  room!"  Then  Leyland  returned  and  Leyland 
sent  him  a  cheque  for  a  thousand  pounds,  and  Whistler  was  furious 
because  it  was  not  guineas.  He  painted  in  gold  on  the  panels  at 
the  end  of  the  room,  the  Rich  Peacock  and  the  Poor  Peacock,  and 
the  shillings  in  silver  under  the  Rich  Peacock's  claw. 

Mr.  Alan  S.  Cole,  much  with  Whistler  at  this  period,  ascribed 
Leyland's  irritation  to  the  length  of  time  Whistler  took,  the  work 
seeming  to  drag  on  indefinitely,  while  he  lost  his  temper  outright 
when  he  heard  of  the  unjustifiable  use,  as  it  appeared  to  him,  of 
his  house,  and  the  publicity  given  to  his  dining-room,  for,  after  all, 
it  did  not  belong  to  Whistler  if  the  decoration  did.  During  several 
talks  with  Mr.  Cole  in  1906  and  1907,  he  told  us  among  other 
things,  on  the  evening  of, 

November  2?th,  1906 — The  leaflet  on  The  Peacock  Room  was  for 
the  press  and  this  more  than  anything,  infuriated  Leyland — the  fact 
of  Whistler,  without  consulting  him,  throwing  open  his  house  to 
people,  inviting  them  there,  and,  indeed,  all  along,  Whistler  used 
the  house  in  that  way,  bringing  people  in  to  see  The  Peacock  Room, 
giving  them  tea,  holding  receptions.  When  the  notices  appeared 
in  the  papers,  Leyland  resented  this  turning  of  his  house  into  a 
public  gallery.  He  offered  Jimmie  the  sum  agreed  upon  to  get  out, 
but  Jimmie  wouldn't  go,  kept  on  asking  people,  said  he  would 
make  Leyland  a  gift  of  the  whole  thing  first.  And,  when  it  was 
complete,  Leyland  could  sit  at  dinner  with  his  back  to  the  Princesse 
108  [1900 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

and  see,  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  room,  the  apotheosis  of  Part  et 
I9  argent!  To  Theodore  Child,  invited  to  dine  at  the  Leylands, 
Whistler  wrote  that  he  would  have  the  rare  pleasure  of  feasting  on 
Roast  Peacock.  The  leather  was  gradually  covered,  and,  as  it 
began  to  become  Whistler's,  it  began  to  get  on  Leyland's  nerves, 
but  what  got  on  them  more  than  anything  was  the  publicity. 
The  crisis  came  with  a  notice  in  The  Morning  Post.  It  was  the 
last  straw  for  Leyland,  and  Whistler  now  did  not-  seem  to  mind 
what  he  did,  he  was  superb;  carriages  crowded  Princes  Gate. 
And  Leyland  was  fine,  keeping  the  Room  and  the  Peacocks  just 
as  they  were.  There  was  no  question  Whistler  was  not  in  the  right. 

As  some  of  the  statements  we  have  quoted  are  either  not  quite 
accurate,  or  else  contradictory,  perhaps,  before  going  further,  we 
had  better  give  Murray  Marks'  description,  as  he  gave  it  to  J.,  of 
the  original  decoration  in  The  Peacock  Room,  for  which  he  was 
responsible,  and  the  changes  in  it  proposed  by  Whistler  and  grad 
ually  made.  J.  saw  him  at  much  the  same  period  that  we  were 
having  our  talks  with  Mr.  Cole  and  Sir  Thomas  Sutherland: — 

December  pth,  1908.  Marks  says  he  was  responsible  for  The  Peacock 
Room,  or  rather  for  having  it  decorated  by  Jekyll,  whom  he  knew. 
He  suggested  and  purchased  the  leather;  Norwich  leather,  not 
Spanish;  and  it  was  painted,  not  embossed.  He  got  the  idea  from 
Lord  Battersea,  then  Cyril  Flower,  who  had  a  room  hung  with 
Spanish  leather  in  which  there  was  Blue  and  White.  Leyland 
bought  the  Princesse  before  there  was  any  idea  of  Whistler's  decor 
ating  the  room,  and  on  the  floor  was  a  rug,  with  a  red  centre  and 
red  lines.  Whistler  objected  to  the  reds  when  the  picture  was 
hung  because  he  said  they  killed  the  rose  in  the  painting,  and 
Leyland  allowed  the  centre  and  the  lines  to  be  taken  out  of  the 
carpet.  In  the  centre  of  each  panel  of  leather,  however,  was  a  red 
flower,  which  also  offended  Whistler,  and  he  painted  or  gilded  all 
the  flowers  over  with  yellow.  The  result,  Whistler  pronounced 
horrible,  as  the  yellow  paint  or  gilding  wouldn't  work  with  the 
yellow  of  the  leather.  And  this  was  the  reason  why  the  peacock 
scheme,  probably  designed  for  Alexander's  house,  was  commenced. 
1900]  109 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Marks  said  further  that,  when  Jekyll  saw  it,  he  hurried  home, 
went  mad,  gilded  his  own  floor  and  died. 

We  quote  still  another  story,  not  because  of  its  accuracy,  which 
we  question,  but  because  it  conies  from  Watts-Dunton.  He  told 
it  one  evening  when  Heinemann  was  dining  with  him  and 
Swinburne  at  "The  Pines"  a  few  months  before  Whistler's  death. 
Heinemann  afterwards  gave  us  the  note  he  made  of  the  even 
ing's  talk: — 

Sunday,  April  26th,  1903.  Watts  told  me  the  whole  story  of  the 
Leyland  row.  Leyland  had  placed  one  of  Whistler's  Japanese 
pictures  over  the  mantelpiece  of  his  dining  room,  the  decoration  of 
which  had  been  entrusted  to  some  well-known  artist,  and  the  walls 
of  which  were  covered  with  most  expensive  Spanish  leather. 
Whistler  considered  that  the  Spanish  leather  entirely  destroyed 
the  effects  of  the  picture,  and  he  got  Leyland's  permission  to 
modify  the  leather  by  painting  on  it.  He  began  in  Leyland's 
presence  with  only  a  few  modifications  in  colour,  but  when 
Leyland  went  away,  he  began  painting  over  practically  the  whole 
leather,  a  fact  which  drove  the  original  artist  mad  (he  died  in  an 
asylum).  Whistler  by  degrees  painted  over  the  whole  room, 
decorating  the  leather  with  peacocks,  but  Watts  denies  that  at  that 
time  the  portrait  of  Leyland  was  painted  in  the  peacock's  tail. 
When  Leyland  returned,  Whistler  took  him  into  the  room  and 
said  to  Leyland :  "Now  I  want  a  cheque  for  two  thousand  pounds." 
Leyland  laughed  at  this  and  took  no  further  notice  of  it.  On  the 
following  Sunday  morning  Leyland  happened  to  be  at  Rossetti's, 
and  told  Rossetti  about  Whistler's  demand.  Rossetti  said  that 
the  whole  thing  was  mad,  that  it  was  outrageous,  but  Leyland 
said  that  he  would  give  Whistler  a  thousand  pounds,  which  Rossetti 
said  was  far  too  much,  and  rather  pooh-poohed  the  idea  of  the 
whole  thing  or  that  Leyland  should  give  him  anything  at  all. 
Leyland,  however,  saw  Whistler  and  offered  him  a  thousand 
pounds,  saying  that  he  would  not  give  him  another  farthing.  He 
had  not  commissioned  the  thing  at  all,  and  as  he  had  done  it 
simply  to  please  himself,  he  considered  the  payment  liberal  and 
no  [1900 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

handsome,  one  which  nobody  else  in  England  would  have  made. 
Whistler  took  the  thousand  pounds  in  disgust,  having  first  declined 
to  take  anything,  but  he  reviled  Leyland  all  over  London,  and 
presumably  painted  in  Leyland's  head  later  on. 

This  statement  about  Leyland's  head  painted  in  the  peacock's 
tail  we  never  heard  from  anyone  else  and  we  never  could  find 
the  head. 

It  was  interesting  to  collect  these  different  versions,  to  fit  them  in 
together,  and  to  work  out  from  them  the  true  story  for  the  Life, 
comparing  and  sifting  the  evidence.  The  more  we  heard,  the  more 
we  were  convinced  it  was  not  the  transformation  of  his  dining  room 
that  incensed  Leyland,  who  must  have  known  from  Whistler's 
letters  to  Mrs.  Leyland,  which  we  have  seen,  if  not  from  letters  to 
himself,  something  of  the  colossal  scale  on  which  Whistler  was 
working.  Otherwise,  the  decorations  would  not  have  extended 
over  months,  would  not  have  kept  him  day  after  day  from  six 
in  the  morning  until  almost  nine  at  night,  would  not  have  obliged 
Leyland  to  put  him  up  at  Princes  Gate,  would  not  have  filled  his 
eyes  with  sleep  and  peacock  feathers,  would  not  have  led  him  to 
send  a  message,  through  Mrs.  Leyland,  warning  "Freddie"  of  the 
price  of  his  labour,  large  though  barely  enough  to  pay  him.  Ley- 
land  probably  would  have  swallowed,  if  grumblingly,  this  large 
sum,  along  with  the  press  and  publicity  and  invitations  scattered 
wholesale,  and  never  quarrelled  with  Whistler.  It  was  Whistler 
who  quarreled  with  him.  If  there  was  one  thing  that  enraged 
Whistler  more  than  another  it  was  to  have  his  "golden  guineas" 
reduced  to  pounds;  to  knock  off  the  shillings  he  considered  the 
height  of  meanness;  it  was  "unbecoming  in  a  transaction  between 
gentlemen."  When  his  Philosopher  was  sold  to  the  Comtesse  de 
Beam  and  Petit,  who  arranged  the  sale,  forgot  the  shillings  in  the 
French  equivalent  of  the  sum  charged  in  English  money,  Whistler 
was  prepared  to  take  legal  action  had  not  M.  Duret  represented 
that  it  might  seem  strange  for  an  American  artist  selling  his  work 
in  France  to  demand  payment  in  English  guineas.  Petit  did  add 
to  the  original  sum,  but  some  of  the  shillings  were  still  missing, 
and  again  Whistler  was  quieted  only  by  M.  Duret's  argument  that 
the  Comtesse  knew  no  more  about  guineas  and  pounds  than  Petit, 
that  she  was  charming,  and  that  therefore  it  would  be  discourteous 
to  insist.  Mr.  Fisher  Unwin  had  a  somewhat  similar  experience. 
For  Whistler's  lithograph  of  J.,  published  as  frontispiece  to  our 
Lithography  and  Lithographers ',  he  sent  Whistler  a  cheque  for  twenty 
1900]  III 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

pounds.  Whistler  returned  it,  saying  "very  nice — but — where  are 
the  shillings?"  And  then  Mr.  Unwin  sent  another  cheque,  this 
time  for  twenty  guineas,  and  all  was  well.  When  Mr.  Croal 
Thomson  was  guilty  of  the  same  crime,  he  was  rebuked  by  Whistler 
for,  like  Leyland,  "cutting  the  shillings  off  my  pounds." 
Leyland  refused  to  pay  two  thousand  guineas.  Whistler  suggested, 
he  would  contribute  one  thousand  himself.  When,  on  top  of  this 
the  cheque  came  for  pounds,  Leyland  had  committed  the  unpardon 
able  sin.  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler,  Mr.  Luke  lonides,  the  Alan  Coles, 
dining  with  us  on  Thursday,  December  19th,  1907,  were  all  of  the 
opinion  that  Leyland  in  doing  this  brought  all  relations  between 
himself  and  Whistler  to  an  end.  They  remembered  an  original 
agreement  for  five  hundred  pounds,  though  Whistler  said  there 
was  no  contract.  It  was  probably  not  in  writing  and  it  was  only 
for  the  touching  up  of  the  leather.  The  great  thing  is  that 
Whistler  knew  the  beauty  he  was  creating  too  well  to  throw  down 
his  brushes  over  the  disputes  of  a  day,  and  that  Leyland  wisely 
preserved  the  masterpiece,  though  he  let  the  master  go.  He  was 
the  custodian  of  one  of  the  greatest  modern  decorations,  he  real 
ized  the  responsibility,  and,  thanks  to  him,  The  Peacock  Room 
exists  to-day,  caricature  and  all,  as  Whistler  left  it,  and  is  now, 
by  the  bequest  of  Charles  Freer,  in  the  possession  of  the  country 
of  which  Whistler  was  proud  to  be  a  citizen. 

A  curious  characteristic  of  Freer's  method  of  collecting  is  recalled 
by  this  reference.  He  had  been  collecting  Whistlers  since  the  early 
Eighties  when  his  attention  was  drawn  by  Mr.  Howard  Mansfield, 
from  the  Palmers  and  Vans'  Gravesandes  he  was  buying,  to  Whist 
ler's  etchings.  Then,  a  little  later,  at  Messrs.  Dowdeswell's  advice 
he  bought  from  Mr.  H.  S.  Theobald,  K.  C.,  the  pastels  which, 
after  the  not  too  successful  show  of  1886  in  their  galleries,  the 
Dowdeswells  had  sold  to  Theobald.  To  Whistler  Freer  introduced 
himself.  His  account  of  it  came  to  us  through  Chase,  of  whom  he 
had  asked  a  letter  of  introduction — probably  after  his  purchase 
of  the  pastels.  Chase  suggested  that  an  introduction  from  him 
would  be  of  anything  but  use,  that  Freer  would  be  better  off  with 
out  it,  and  so  without  it,  Freer  called.  He  sent  up  his  name.  The 
servant  came  back  to  say  Whistler  would  see  him  in  five  minutes. 
Freer  took  out  his  watch  and  timed  him.  In  exactly  five  minutes 
he  appeared,  a  little  dapper  figure,  with  a  monocle  in  his  right  eye. 
Freer  said,  "Fm  an  American,  Mr.  Whistler,  just  from  America. 
I  heard  that  you  made  an  etching  once  and  I  would  like  to  see  it." 
Whistler  took  off  his  monocle,  wiped  it  carefully  put  it  up  again, 
looked  at  Freer,  asked  him  into  the  studio,  made  him  stay  to  lunch. 
112  [190x3 


THE  LEYLANDS — THEIR  CIRCLE 

Freer  explained  that  he  tried  to  make  himself  as  American  as  pos 
sible! — an  amusing  tale,  but  we  rather  wonder  if  Whistler  could 
not  have  told  it  better.  However,  from  the  Nineties  on,  Freer 
never  came  to  Europe  without  seeing  Whistler  in  London  or  Paris, 
buying  paintings,  prints  and  drawings  from  him,  or  from  owners 
willing  to  part  with  them.  Nor  did  his  collecting  cease  with 
Whistler's  death.  At  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  in  London, 
1905,  he  bought  the  portrait  of  Leyland,  and  what  we  want  to 
point  out  as  characteristic  is  the  fact  that,  though  he  doubtless 
could  have  had  the  Mrs.  Leyland,  he  never  purchased  it  and  it 
went  to  Mr.  Frick.  Freer  also,  for  some  unknown  reason,  refused 
to  purchase  the  portrait  of  Whistler  with  the  paint  brushes,  his 
best  portrait  of  himself,  which  is  now  owned  by  Mr.  Stevens  of 
Detroit.  It  was  offered  to  Freer  by  Mr.  Coutts  Michie,  who 
married  the  widow  of  George  McCulloch,  the  owner,  and  Freer 
took  instead  from  the  McCulloch  collection,  when  it  was  being  sold, 
another  version  of  the  Valparaiso  nocturne  which  he  already  had. 
Freer  also  refused  to  purchase  the  portrait  of  Dr.  Whistler  which 
belonged  to  his  widow,  Mrs.  William  Whistler,  and  the  study  of 
Luke  lonides  in  that  gentleman's  collection,  both  of  which  were 
also  offered  to  him.  He  did  not  buy  the  last  two  because  he  did 
not  like  their  owners,  and  so  Freer  deprived  himself  and,  more 
important,  his  country,  of  works,  by  Whistler  because  of  his  per 
sonal  likes  and  dislikes. 

Another  painting  Mr.  Freer  let  slip  from  him  is  The  Gold  Scab. 
With  the  Mount  Ararat  and  The  Loves  of  the  Lobsters  which  he  did 
buy,  it  would  have  completed  the  history  of  The  Peacock  Room. 
All  three  are  caricatures,  as  bitter  as  the  peacocks  on  the  walls. 
The  Gold  Scab  is  horrible  in  its  strange  beauty.  The  Dowdeswells, 
who  bought  it  at  Sotheby's  sale  after  the  bankruptcy,  sold  it  to  a 
Captain  Hubbell.  When  they  asked  him  what  he  wanted  to  do 
with  it,  he  said  he  proposed  to  present  it  to  Leyland's  Club.  But 
this  did  not  come  off,  and  the  next  thing  heard  of  the  painting  was 
Jacomb-Hood's  finding  it  in  a  pawnshop  in  the  King's  Road, 
Chelsea,  though  how  it  got  there  was,  and  still  is,  a  mystery. 
From  Jacomb-Hood,  it  passed  to  San  Francisco,  and  is  there  now, 
we  believe  in  Mrs.  Spreckles'  collection,  though  it  ought  to  be  in 
Washington,  where  Whistler  would  have  wished  it  that,  as  he  used 
to  say,  history  might  be  made. 


1900]  113 

8 


CHAPTER  IX:  THE  GREAVES.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

IT  was  in  the  note  for  July  i6th,  given  in  the  last  chapter,  that 
the  names  of  the  Greaves  brothers  first  appear  in  The  Whistler 
Journal.  J.  had  met  Walter  Greaves  a  year  or  two  before — Harry 
Greaves  was  dead.  One  day,  walking  with  Whistler  on  the  Chelsea 
Embankment,  J.  had  been  amazed  to  see  approaching  a  strange 
faraway  echo  of  Whistler,  the  chief  difference  being  that  the  echo 
was  shabby  and  wore  a  red  necktie,  and  before  he  got  over  his 
amazement  Whistler  had  introduced  him.  Walter  Greaves  seems 
always  to  have  tried  to  get  himself  up  like  Whistler,  and  was  still 
trying  when  we  last  saw  him.  It  sometimes  led  to  mistakes.  One 
amusing  story  we  had  from  Mr.  Oliver  Brown: — 

Thursday,  March  2$rd,  1913.  He  was  dining  with  us  and  the  talk 
turned  on  Greaves.  He  said  his  father,  or  some  one  who  was  there, 
told  him  of  a  dinner  the  Chelsea  Arts  Club  gave  to  Whistler.  A 
little  while  before  the  dinner  hour,  some  of  the  Committee,  who 
were  attending  to  the  last  details  and  who  had  never  met  Whistler, 
saw  an  elderly  man  come  in  with  long  overcoat  and  straight- 
brimmed  hat  and  white  gloves,  thought  it  must  be  Whistler, 
received  him  effusively,  and  fluttered  about  him,  until  some  of  the 
older  members  of  the  Committee  arrived,  said  he  wasn't  Whistler, 
and  asked  him  who  he  was.  He  said  his  name  was  Greaves  and  he 
was  a  pupil  and  a  friend  of  Whistler's.  And  so,  though  he  had  not 
been  asked,  they  gave  him  a  good  place  at  the  table  and  insisted 
on  his  staying.  Then  Whistler  came,  presently  saw  him,  put  up 
his  monocle,  stared  at  him,  said  nothing,  and  Greaves  faded  away. 

The  next  mention  of  Greaves  in  The  Journal  was  after  Whistler's 
death,  on  February  Qth,  190$,  when  J.  was  busy  arranging  the 
Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  at  the  New  Gallery.  An  important 
letter  came  in  his  absence  and  E.  hurried  with  it  to  the  Gallery: 
"While  I  was  there  one  of  the  Greaves  brothers  who  figure  in 
Whistler's  early  Chelsea  days  turned  up.  He  also  has  lent  things." 
One  morning,  a  year  later: — 

May  $th,  1906.  J.  was  working  in  Chelsea,  making  an  etching  of 
the  old  Church,  and  one  of  the  Greaves  brothers  wandered  up  to 
114  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

talk  to  him.  Probably  no  one  living  knows  more  of  Whistler  in 
the  old  Chelsea  days,  and  he  told  J.  he  would  be  delighted  to  recall 
all  he  could,  if  J.  would  go  to  see  him.  His  memory  is  still  fresh  of 
the  "times"  there  had  been  in  the  evenings,  of  the  people  who 
came  to  the  house  and  went  out  with  Whistler  on  his  father's  boats. 
There  had  been  noise.  Whistler  was  always  ready  for  it,  he  was 
always  gay.  But  what  affair  was  that  of  his?  Why  should  he 
talk  about  that?  The  nights  when  Whistler  worked,  his  usual 
method  was  to  make  sketches  on  brown  paper  with  black  and 
white  chalk.  These  were  his  notes.  And  as  for  his  pictures,  his 
nocturnes,  it  was  all  wrong  what  he  said  in  court.  They  were 
usually  done  in  about  an  hour  and  a  half.  But  then,  he  probably 
destroyed  many  before  he  succeeded  in  getting  just  what  he  wanted. 
He  used  a  quantity  of  McGilp  or  whatever  was  the  medium,  his 
paint  was  as  fluid  as  water  colour,  and  there  were  times  when  the 
canvas  was  so  dripping,  he  had  to  put  it  down  on  the  floor  for  a 
while.  It  was  quite  true  that  many  of  the  nocturnes  were  painted 
on  a  red  ground.  But  he  told  J.  to  come  and  see  him  and  he  could 
talk  better  and  tell  him  more. 

Whistler's  method  of  making  nocturnes  has  been  more  or  less 
described  by  Way  and  Menpes.  As  Whistler  told  J.,  it  was  as 
hard  as  training  for  a  foot  race.  He  would  note  an  evening  effect 
and  come  back  from  dinner  by  the  same  spot  night  after  night, 
and  one  night  the  nocturne  would  be  there,  the  effect  he  wanted. 
And  he  would  stand,  leaning  on  the  Embankment  wall,  looking. 
And  when  he  had  looked  long,  he  would  turn  round  with  his  back 
to  the  subject,  and  begin  to  recite  the  subject  in  a  sort  of  chant. 
"The  sky  is  lighter  than  the  water,  the  houses  darkest.  There  are 
eight  houses,  the  second  is  the  lowest,  the  fifth  the  highest.  The 
tone  of  all  is  the  same.  The  first  has  two  lighted  windows,  one 
above  the  other;  the  second  has  four."  "No,"  said  Way.  Then 
Whistler  would  wheel  about,  look,  and  correct  his  mistakes,  turn 
his  back  and  begin  again.  And  so  it  would  go  on  till  he  was  right, 
then  he  would  say  "Good-night,"  go  straight  home  to  bed,  and  the 
next  day  paint  his  nocturne. 

J.  was  away  from  London  through  the  summer  of  1906,  but  on 
his  return  in  the  autumn  he  made  three  visits  to  Greaves  and  E. 
also  called. 

1900]  115 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

September  loth,  1906.  In  the  afternoon  J.  went  to  Fulham  to  look 
up  Walter  Greaves  who  has  not  answered  his  note.  Greaves  was 
away  but  Miss  Greaves  was  at  home  and  appeared,  an  elderly 
woman  in  yellow  wig  and  much  jewelry,  low  dress  and  many  neck 
laces.  She  had  a  good  deal  to  say  about  Whistler.  She  had  posed 
for  him,  she  was  "Tinnie,"  she  had  sat  for  anything  he  wanted, 
there  were  the  etchings  of  her.  She  knew  J.  had  written,  she  had 
seen  his  note,  she  did  not  know  why  her  brother  had  not  answered, 
and  it  was  arranged  that  J.  should  call  next  Tuesday  when  he  would 
be  back. 

Tuesday,  September  i8th,  1906.  In  the  afternoon  J.  went  to  see 
the  Greaves  in  Fulham.  As  to  Whistler's  painting:  he  painted  all 
the  important  pictures,  the  Mother,  the  Carlyle,  Miss  Alexander, 
the  nocturnes  which  Greaves  calls  Moonlights  in  the  second  house 
from  the  east  end  of  Lindsey  Row  as  it  was  then,  and  not  Cheyne 
Walk,  one  of  the  two  houses  which  stand  out.  The  studio  was  in 
the  first  floor  back.  The  Mother  was  painted  on  the  back  of  a 
canvas;  the  Miss  Alexander,  on  an  absorbent  canvas,  on  a  dis 
temper  ground.  He  also  pointed  out  that  the  Mother  was  painted 
so  thinly,  especially  her  dress,  that  the  black  dado  which  evidently 
at  one  time  had  been  painted  all  across  the  picture  could  be  seen 
through  her.  J.  suggested  that  it  might  have  been  at  the  start 
another  picture  but  Greaves  did  not  think  so.  The  nocturnes, 
moonlights,  were  painted  on  this  absorbent  canvas  on  a  red 
ground,  or  on  mahogany  which  he  got  from  Greaves — the  red 
forcing  up  the  blues  laid  on  it.  He  also  says  that  Whistler 
worked  with  linseed  oil  only  on  these  nocturnes  mixing  his  colour 
on  a  big  flat  table  large  quantities  of  it  with  a  great  deal  of  oil, 
calling  it  "sauce,"  washing  it  on  like  a  water  colour  [this  Whistler 
always  said  he  did]  and  often  having  to  put  the  canvas  flat  on  the 
floor  to  keep  the  whole  thing  from  running  off.  Greaves  also  said 
that  it  used  to  dry  out  like  a  wash  of  body  colour.  Whistler  always 
told  J.  that  this  medium  was  made  of  McGilp,  copal,  turps  or  lin 
seed  oil.  But  Greaves  says  he  never  knew  him  to  use  anything 
but  oil.  Greaves  also  says  that  he  and  his  brother  painted  the 
116  [1900 


CHELSEA  EMBANKMENT 

WATER-COLOUR 


(See  page  50) 


NOTE  FOR  NOCTURNE 

BLACK  AND  WHITE  CHALK 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  T.  R.  Way 


(See  page  115) 


THE  GREAVES 

frames  and  that  they  worked  on  The  Peacock  Room  which  was 
first  gilded  all  over  and  then  the  design  painted  on  it  in  blue.  Also 
he  says  he  used  to  show  the  studio  to  people  and  remembers  Tom 
Taylor  coming  there.  In  wiping  his  plates  Whistler  used  three 
rags  and  then  wiped  with  his  hand  and  finally  Greaves  says  pulled 
the  ink  out  of  the  lines  with  a  bit  of  muslin,  really  the  retroussage 
he  later  objected  to.  The  Greaves  first  met  him  in  1859  or  60 — 
and  he  says  we  taught  him  to  row  and  he  taught  us  to  paint, 
to  row  with  what  he  calls  the  Waterman's  Jerk.  Frequently  very 
early  in  the  morning,  sometimes  at  five,  they  would  row  up  as  far 
as  Putney  and  get  breakfast  at  HowelPs  when  he  was  living  there. 
Howell  he  described  as  all  sorts  of  adjectives — Jew  and  liar. 
He  apparently  got  etchings  out  of  Greaves  for  next  to  nothing. 
Whistler  seems  to  have  been  on  the  river  a  great  deal  and  to  have 
loved  it,  sometimes  staying  out  all  night  when  after  his  moonlights. 
He  never  tried  to  use  colour  at  night  or  at  Cremorne  Gardens,  but 
made  notes  on  brown  paper  in  black  and  white  chalk.  He  lived 
in  two  places  in  Lindsey  Row.  The  first  was  the  third  from  the 
west  end  but  Greaves  says  he  did  very  little  there.  The  Greaves 
themselves  lived  in  the  little  white  house  which  juts  out  at  the 
far  end  of  the  row  and  shows  very  distinctly  in  Haden's  etching 
and  in  J's.  Greaves  has  several  of  Whistler's  drawings  of  these 
houses.  He  says  at  the  same  time  Brunei  who  built  the  Great 
Eastern  lived  in  the  easternmost  house,  and  in  the  middle  one 
with  a  balcony  Martin  the  Scriptural  painter  lived.  And  on  fine 
moonlight  nights  Greaves  or  his  father  when  they  were  out  late 
and  there  was  a  fine  sky,  at  Martin's  request,  would  knock  at  his 
door  and  the  old  man  in  his  nightcap  would  appear  on  the  balcony 
and  go  to  work  at  the  skies  for  hours.  It  was  in  the  second  house, 
however,  that  all  the  important  pictures  were  painted.  He  also 
says  that  Whistler,  he,  and  his  brother  went  to  a  life  school  kept 
by  Somebody  Barthe  in  Lymmerson  Street  for  one  winter — that 
often  after  dinner  he  would  come  into  their  house  sometimes  send 
ing  in  dessert  and  things  and  come  along  afterwards  himself.  And 
all  the  time  he  was  sketching  on  brown  paper  in  the  evenings. 
They  had  a  large  number  of  these  things,  some  were  shown  in  the 
1900]  II 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

International  Memorial  Exhibition.  He  said  in  those  early  days 
things  were  extremely  lively  in  the  studio.  There  were  always 
a  lot  of  women  hanging  round  and  sometimes  there  were  terrific 
rows,  and  they  used  to  get  into  awful  rows  at  Cremorne.  Jo's  name 
(he  thinks  she  finally  got  married,  she  was  the  mother  of  Whistler's 
son  Harry)  was  Mrs.  Abbott,  while  Maud  was  Miss  Franklin. 
Carlyle  was  very  impatient,  especially  when  Whistler  worked  with 
small  brushes  and  to  quiet  him  Whistler  worked  with  big  brushes 
or  pretended  to.  When  his  own  exhibition  came  off  in  Pall  Mall, 
the  Whistler  and  Greaves  families  wrote  the  cards  of  invitation  and 
they  all  made  Butterflies  on  them  as  hard  as  they  could  and  filled 
the  letter  boxes  in  that  part  of  Chelsea  with  them,  but  he  didn't 
seem  to  think  that  many  people  went  to  the  show.  Whistler 
laughed  all  his  troubles  off.  A  grocer  named  Stevens  to  whom 
he  owed,  they  say,  a  lot  of  money  either  seized  or  took  in  payment 
several  pictures.  Greaves  says  that  the  grocer's  children  are  still 
in  Fulham  though  he  does  not  know  where.  But  they  came  to 
him  a  year  or  so  ago  to  ask  as  to  the  selling  of  these  pictures.  And 
there  was  a  coal  merchant  or  something  of  that  sort  who,  Miss 
Greaves  says,  went  mad  because  he  couldn't  get  his  money. 
Greaves  used  to  buy  all  his  colours  and  acids  for  him  over  in 
Battersea  and  apparently,  as  he  said,  finally  got  to  do  nothing  but 
"fetching  and  carrying."  They  don't  seem  to  have  had  any  real 
row  though  apparently  Whistler  objected  to  the  work  done  at 
Streatham  Town  Hall.  He  says  he,  Greaves,  called  at  the  house 
a  few  days  before  Whistler  died  but  they  wouldn't  let  him  in.  On 
the  one  hand  he  and  his  sister  complained  that  nobody  ever  got 
paid  and  apparently  they  did  not,  yet  on  the  other  they  were  always 
praising  his  generosity,  saying  that  the  front  door  was  literally 
wide  open  and  that  somebody  was  always  in  the  studio.  J.  has  an 
idea  that  this  open  door  was  taken  great  advantage  of,  and  was 
one  of  the  reasons  that  made  him  bitter  about  certain  people. 
They  corroborated  the  story  about  the  bailiffs  being  made  into 
waiters.  Miss  Greaves  said  that  on  one  occasion  he  invited  her 
and  her  sister  to  a  Promenade  Concert  at  Covent  Garden,  and 
took  two  hansoms  and  drove  up  to  town.  When  they  got  to  the 
118  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

paper  shop  of  an  old  woman  near  Drury  Lane  he  stopped  the  cabs 
as  he  found  no  one  in  the  party  had  any  money,  went  in,  borrowed 
two  sovereigns  of  her,  paid  off  the  cabs  and  bought  the  tickets  for 
the  concert  with  the  remainder.  How  they  got  back  to  Chelsea, 
J.  forgot  to  ask.  Miss  Greaves  insists  the  old  woman  never  got 
her  money  back.  But  Miss  Greaves  is  very  positive  he  never  paid 
anybody,  which,  of  course,  is  not  so.  There  is  evidently  something 
on  the  financial  side  that  upsets  Miss  Greaves.  They  say  there 
were  two  plays  at  least  in  which  he  was  put  on  the  stage.  One 
was  called  The  Grasshopper,  the  name  of  the  other  they  don't 
remember.  But  they  think  it  was  in  The  Grasshopper  that  Whistler, 
Wilde  and  Frank  Miles  had  a  song  and  dance.  He  spoke  of  George 
Holmes  who  lives  next  door  but  one  to  old  Chelsea  Church,  who 
knows  a  lot,  and  the  parson  Davies  might  too,  but  Davies  never 
much  approved  of  Whistler.  Greaves  never  knew  Rossetti  and 
says  that  Rossetti  never  came  to  Whistler's.  But  Greaves  was 
never  invited  to  functions,  he  was  in  constantly  in  the  evenings 
but  does  not  seem  to  have  been  asked  about  by  the  others.  Being 
a  boat  builder  was,  no  doubt,  against  him.  Miss  Greaves  also 
says  that  on  one  occasion  at  The  Vale  there  was  a  terrible  row 
between  Maud  and  Mrs.  Godwin,  and  that  Jimmie  threw  them 
all  into  the  street  and  shut  the  house.  There  was  such  a  scene 
that  Maud  broke  a  blood  vessel  and  Jimmie  went  off  to  the  chemist 
and  asked  him  to  come  and  see  her.  But  the  chemist  said  he  wasn't 
a  doctor  and  refused.  What  the  end  of  it  was  she  did  not  seem  to 
know.  They  all  hated  Mrs.  Whistler  whom  Miss  Greaves  described 
as  "  a  fat  thing."  Then  came  another  Carlyle  story:  Greaves  said 
that  sometimes  they  would  be  together,  Whistler  and  themselves, 
and  other  friends  perhaps,  leaning  against  or  sitting  on  a  wall  by 
the  river,  and  Carlyle  would  pass,  and  some  one  would  say  "It's 
a  fine  day,  Mr.  Carlyle," — all  Chelsea  was  like  a  village  then — and 
Carlyle  would  say  "Tell  me  something,  mon,  I  dinna  ken,"  and 
pass  on  without  even  looking  at  them.  Greaves  says  that  the 
man  in  a  picture  of  the  Thames  that  corresponds  in  the  descrip 
tion  to  Mrs.  Hutton's  Wapping,  is  one  of  their  boatmen. 
1900]  119 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Friday,  September  2ist,  1906.  J.  went  again  to  see  the  Greaves. 
As  to  Whistler  and  Velazquez,  Greaves  went  with  him  to  an  Old 
Masters  show  at  the  Academy  where  they  saw  the  Philip  on  horse 
back  as  Greaves  called  it — evidently  the  Olivarez  or  the  Don 
Baltasar.  Whistler  was  enthusiastic  about  the  hunting  picture  in 
the  National  Gallery  and  the  little  head  of  Philip,  and  even  then 
reviled  the  Turners.  Greaves'  father  knew  Turner  and  used  to 
row  him  about  just  as  the  sons  rowed  Whistler.  Turner  used  to 
walk  about  Chelsea  with  Mrs.  Booth  who  was  a  big  loud  coarse 
Scotchwoman,  and  he  would  ask  Greaves  what  kind  of  a  day  it 
would  be.  If  he  thought  it  would  be  fine  they  would  go  off,  often 
being  rowed  over  to  Battersea  church  or  the  fields  which  are  now 
Battersea  Park.  If  it  was  not  fine,  he  would  say,  "Well,  Mrs. 
Booth,  we  won't  go  far."  Turner  wanted  to  buy  the  house  from 
Mrs.  Booth  which  Greaves  says  he  had  papered  with  drawings  but 
apparently  there  were  what  he  calls  "private  affairs"  between  her, 
Turner,  and  the  other  old  woman  from  Queen  Square  and  it  never 
came  off.  Greaves  does  not  remember  Turner  but  he  does  remem 
ber  Mrs.  Booth  of  whom  as  a  boy,  he  was  much  afraid.  Whistler, 
always  reviled  Turner.  He  says  that  Whistler  often  put  paintings 
out  to  bleach  in  the  back  yard  and  that  that  dried  them  thoroughly, 
taking  the  oil  out  of  them  and  making  them  look  like  ivory.  He 
remembers  the  first  house  was  not  the  third  but  the  fourth  from 
the  corner,  and  Whistler  painted  in  it  (though  Greaves  don't 
remember  the  date  when  he  went  to  it)  the  Princesse;  the  second 
and  the  third  Symphonies  in  White;  the  interior  of  the  studio,  a 
picture  he  calls  Violet  and  Gold — a  Japanese  thing;  the  portrait, 
the  full  length,  of  Leyland;  and  the  Battersea  Bridge;  also  the  studies 
of  the  river  in  ice  (of  course  not  The  Thames  in  Ice)  which  he  worked 
on  his  grey  absorbent  canvas  in  yellow  ochre,  black,  red  and  white. 
Sometimes  he  got  the  whole  of  one  of  these  effects  in  fifteen  or 
twenty  minutes  and  only  just  touched  it  up  afterwards.  He  says 
some  of  the  pictures  were  painted  on  bare  brown  Hollands  sized 
and  that  on  the  portrait  of  his  Mother  there  was  scarcely  any  paint 
at  all  and  that  the  canvas  was  simply  rubbed  over  to  get  the  dress, 
and  that  is  the  reason  why  the  dado  shows  through,  while  the 
120  [19°° 


1- 


NOCTURNE 

OIL 

By  Walter  Greaves 
In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 

NOCTURNE 

OIL 

By    Whistler 
In  the  possession  of  the  Estate  of  Mrs.  Leyland 


(See  base  116) 


LORD  WOLSELEY 

DRY-POINT.  M.    164 


THE  GREAVES 

handkerchief  was  nothing  but  a  bit  of  white  and  oil.  He  now  says 
Whistler  mixed  turps  with  the  oil,  probably  he  will  at  length  get 
to  the  copal  Whistler  told  J.  was  mixed  with  it.  Not  all  the  moon 
lights  came  off,  and  he  painted,  on  some  occasions,  one  on  top  of 
another.  One  only  was  painted  on  a  white  ground.  But  as  Whistler 
said  the  day  is  grey,  the  sky  is  grey  and  the  water  is  grey,  there 
fore  the  canvas  should  be  grey.  The  fireworks  were  painted  on  a 
lead  ground.  The  dining  room  of  the  last  house  was  blue  with  a 
darker  blue  dado  and  doors,  and  purple  Japanese  fans  tacked  on 
the  walls  and  ceiling.  The  drawing-room,  which  was  not  finished 
until  one  afternoon  when  a  big  party  was  asked  and  they  all  worked 
like  mad,  was  flesh  colour.  There  were  white-and-yellow  doors 
and  strips  of  Japanese  tapestry  about.  The  studio  was  grey  with 
a  black  dado  and  doors  as  in  the  picture,  and  evidently  the  cretonne 
was  there  too  as  in  the  portrait  of  the  Mother.  He  called  the 
servants  R.  A.s  and  would  ask  Frith  to  bring  this  and  Leighton 
to  take  that  away.  Even  then,  he  was  fond  of  mimicking  things, 
saws  and  rockets,  and  loved  American  mechanical  toys,  and  called 
himself  the  Pride  of  the  Row.  He  bought  the  best  brushes  he  could 
get  and  heated  them  over  a  candle  to  dissolve  the  glue,  and  then 
pushed  them  into  whatever  shape  he  wanted.  The  big  table  palette 
had  the  Butterfly  in  ivory  in  the  corner  of  it.  Greaves  knew  all 
these  things  because  he  passed  days  and  weeks  in  the  place  standing 
beside  him.  He  often  put  the  coats  of  size  on  the  canvas.  Every 
body  came  there.  He  remembers  the  Princess  Louise  and  Wolseley 
and  often  there  were  strings  of  broughams  and  cabs  before  the  door. 
He  was  ill  once  in  the  second  house  with  some  sort  of  fever,  and 
ate  ice  which  frightened  Greaves.  All  the  big  canvases  had  to  be 
oiled  out,  but,  despite  this,  they  all  dried  in  again.  He  was  drawing 
chimneys  one  day  across  the  river  and  the  other  brother  Greaves 
said,  "But,  Mr.  Whistler,  they  are  not  straight."  Whistler  said, 
"But  they  are  Whistler's."  Another  thing:  Greaves  says  Howell 
came  into  the  Lindsey  Row  house  one  day  and  saw  a  lot  of  plates 
kicking  round  under  the  press,  Greaves  thinks  the  London  and 
some  of  the  French  ones,  and  Howell  said,  "Why,  you  have  a  gold 
mine  here,"  and  that's  when  it  was  Goulding  was  sent  for,  which 
1900]  121 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

corresponds  with  Whistler's  story  to  E.  In  the  beginning  he 
used  big  etching  needles,  big  double  ended  ones  and  later  those  in 
wood  like  a  pencil  which  he  gradually  cut  and  sharpened  down, 
and  eventually  gave  all  to  Greaves,  telling  him  to  use  them  because 
they  wouldn't  slip.  Goulding  came  down  once  or  twice  to  prove 
plates.  Haden  wanted  the  Fine  Art  Society  to  get  Goulding  to 
print  the  Venice  plates  but  Whistler  said  he  wasn't  running  an 
aquarium  or  a  music  hall.  Greaves  says  that  most  of  the  Chelsea 
plates  were  done  at  one  sitting,  that  is  that  he  worked  on  them  in 
the  house,  he  never  went  back  again.  He  said  the  stairs  of  the 
house  were  covered  with  Dutch  metal.  J.  forgot  to  ask  if  it  was 
only  the  banisters,  or  the  whole  thing  in  which  case  it  probably 
gave  Alma-Tadema  his  brazen  idea.  Whistler  painted  ships  at 
the  end  of  the  hall  one  Sunday  morning  after  he  had  taken  his 
mother  to  church  and  before  she  returned.  The  blue  screen  with 
the  gold  moon  and  bridge  upon  it,  which  always  stood  in  the 
studios  in  Paris  and  Fitzroy  Street,  Greaves  says  was  painted  for 
Leyland.  But,  if  so,  either  Leyland  never  had  it,  or  else  gave  it 
back  to  Whistler.  Greaves  got  to  know  him  when  he  first  came 
there  because  the  brothers  were  trying  to  paint,  and  Whistler, 
finding  this  out  asked  them  to  come  and  see  him.  Greaves  is  for 
ever  talking  about  mysterious  "private  affairs"  but  J.  can  get 
nothing  definite  out  of  him,  and  it  probably  refers  to  the  gay  times 
in  the  studio.  Greaves  says  also  that  in  doing  the  full-length  Ley- 
land,  he  got  into  an  awful  mess  over  it,  painting  it  out  again  and 
again  until  finally,  he  had  a  model  in  to  pose  for  him  nude,  showing 
that  the  idea  was  suggested  probably  by  Ary  Scheffer  or  Leighton. 

Thursday,  January  i^th,  1907.  Walter  Greaves  came  in  unex 
pectedly  while  we  were  at  lunch.  He  stayed  quite  a  little  while, 
repeating  many  things  he  had  already  told  J.,  telling  others  in  a 
disjointed  fashion  it  is  hard  to  follow.  We  showed  him  the  photo 
graph  of  Mrs.  Hutton's  Wapping  and  he  was  puzzled.  It  did  not 
seem  to  him  the  picture  he  remembered,  but  then  his  memory 
may  be  at  fault,  for  he  was  surprised  at  the  Memorial  Show  to 
find  the  Westminster  picture  so  much  smaller  than  he  remembered 

122 


WHISTLER'S  ETCHING  NEEDLE 

Actual  size,  given  by  Whistler  to  Joseph  Pennell 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


11 

?Hfc 


(See  Page  124) 


THE  TABLE  PALETTE 
Used  in  Fulham  Studio 

WASH 

By  G.  P.  Jacomb-Hood 


MR.  ELDON 

OIL 

Once  in  the  possession  of  Mr.  Walter  Sickert  and  attributed  by  him  to  Whistler 


THE  GREAVES 

it,  and  from  his  suggestion  of  measurements  it  was  clear  that,  at 
the  Show,  it  looked  to  him  much  smaller  than  it  was.  Then 
he  recalled  odd  incidents:  of  Phil  Morris  whom  Whistler  liked, 
and  when  anyone  wondered  why,  he  would  say,  "He  fights  my 
battles";  of  an  irate  Captain,  who  lived  next  door  to  Whistler  and 
was  usually  tipsy  and  then  violent  beyond  measure.  His  pigeons 
somehow  became  a  nuisance  to  Whistler  who  wanted  Greaves  to 
tell  him  so.  Greaves  refused,  said  the  Captain  was  too  violent. 
"Then  I'll  go,"  said  Whistler,  who  was  never  afraid  of  anything; 
he  did,  and  almost  at  once  came  flying  out  of  the  door,  the  Captain, 
armed  with  a  sword,  at  his  heels,  and  Whistler  was  fortunate,  for 
sometimes  people  came  flying  out  of  the  first  floor  windows.  And 
Greaves  remembers  how  Whistler  would  have  a  passing  hurdy- 
gurdy  in  the  little  garden  in  front  of  the  house  to  play  for  a  quarter 
of  an  hour  or  so,  because  he  liked  music.  "He  was  a  rare  fellow 
for  music,"  Greaves  said,  and  he  and  his  brother  would  play  for 
hours  in  the  evening  while  Whistler  danced.  And  he  was  "a 
rare  fellow,"  too,  for  round  games  of  cards  and  for  all  sorts  of  fun. 
He  would  imitate  a  man  sawing,  and  once,  out  in  the  hall,  he 
imitated  another  man  quarrelling  with  him  so  well,  that  when  he 
came  into  the  room,  Mrs.  Greaves  couldn't  understand  why  he 
was  alone  and  unhurt. 

There  were  times,  of  course,  when  Mrs.  Whistler  disapproved. 
She  was  indignant  the  Sunday  she  came  home  and  found  them 
painting  the  ships  in  the  hall.  Then  more  odd  memories:  of  Albert 
Moore's  going  out  sometimes  in  the  boat  with  them  at  night;  of 
pictures  painted  one  on  top  of  another,  one  of  Harry  Greaves  on 
top  of  a  moonlight,  and,  indeed,  he  always  wondered  that  pictures 
like  the  Mother  and  Miss  Alexander  had  lasted;  of  Eldon  who  lent 
him  two  hundred  pounds  and  the  indignation  of  Eldon's  mother  who 
came  down  upon  \Vhistler  for  it;  of  Tinnie,  who  played  so  much 
better  after  X.  had  been  living  with  WThistler.  And  then  of  the 
way  Whistler  worked,  "he  was  a  wonderful  fellow  for  working," 
endless  sketches  on  paper  for  the  Cremorne  and  all  the  other 
pictures.  And  then  of  the  drawing-room  he  painted  at  the  last 
moment,  that  is  on  the  very  day  he  was  to  have  a  dinner  party. 
1900]  123 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Greaves  suggested  that  it  would  never  dry  in  time,  but  Whistler 
said  what  matter,  it  would  only  mean  a  little  paint  on  a  coat  or  a 
dress.  And  then  of  that  same  dinner  party  when  Whistler  sent 
one  of  the  Greaves'  men  to  Madame  Venturi's  to  borrow  kettles 
and  pots  and  pans,  and  the  man  came  back  covered  all  over  with 
them.  There  was  a  testimonial  got  up,  he  couldn't  remember  why, 
to  James  Stansfield,  an  M.  P.,  friend  of  Madame  Venturi's,  and 
she  got  the  work  of  designing  and  making  it  for  Whistler.  But  he 
didn't  know  anything  about  that  sort  of  writing,  and  he  handed 
it  over  to  them.  They  had  had  practice  in  the  heraldic  marks  on 
the  Lord  Mayor's  and  the  City's  barges,  and  they  also  were  then 
making  Whistler's  frames  for  him,  and  they  got  it  up,  and  Whistler 
paid  them  five  pounds,  and  they  made  a  tin  box  for  it,  and  it  was 
sent  all  over  the  world  for  the  signatures  of  distinguished  literary 
men.  And  it  was  travelling  for  six  months. 

Monday,  October  iflh,  1907.  Went  to  see  the  Greaves  at  Fulham. 
Did  not  hear  very  much  that  we  had  not  heard  before,  except  that 
the  brothers  helped  to  fix  the  "Pink  Palace"  and  studio  in  Fulham. 
The  cottage  where  Whistler  lived  was  almost  directly  opposite 
their  house.  It  has  been  pulled  down,  and  two  little  shops  built 
there.  A  little  further  west  is  the  gate  leading  to  the  group  of 
studios  where  his  was.  It  all  looks  shabby  enough  now.  Miss 
Greaves  talked  chiefly  of  Whistler's  gaiety,  it  was  all  wonderful, 
she  told  again  how  he  used  to  come  in  to  them  in  the  evening. 
His  son,  she  said,  was  Jo's  and  was  born  at  No.  7.  Jo's  sister,  got 
up  like  a  French  nurse,  took  care  of  him  and  would  take  him  out 
walking,  up  and  down  the  Row.  Then  a  carriage  came  one  day, 
and  French  nurse,  baby  and  all,  got  in  and  went  to  Paris.  She 
thought  Whistler  was  jealous  of  other  people.  He  would  never 
let  the  two  "boys"  show  anything.  Their  father  did  not  like  them 
working  with  him,  leaving  a  business  that  paid  good  money.  She 
said  that  No.  7  Lindsey  Row  and  the  two  other  houses  west  of  it 
were  not  part  of  the  palace,  but  stables  and  outhouses  had  stood 
there.  Whistler,  she  said,  used  to  give  money  to  X.  to  pay  the 
weekly  bills  and  X.  would  call  for  her  sister  and  take  her  out  and 
124  [1900 


INTERIOR  OF  THE  STUDIO,  FULHAM 
From  a  drawing  by  G.  P.  Jacomb-Hood 


(See  page  116) 


TINNIE  GREAVES 

DRY-POINT.      M.   141 


THE  GREAVES 

give  her  a  wonderful  lunch  and  send  her  home  laden  with  flowers 
and  chocolates,  and  the  bills  never  got  paid.  Greaves  said  the 
door  at  No.  7  was  literally  open.  And  that  was  about  all.  except 
to  repeat  what  we  had  already  heard. 

Two  or  three  years  after  these  visits,  drawings  and  prints  attributed 
to  Whistler  and  found  in  Mr.  Spencer's  second-hand  bookshop  in 
New  Oxford  Street  were  brought  to  J.  by  more  than  one  collector 
and  bookseller  for  his  opinion.  He  saw  faint  suggestions  of  Whistler 
in  some  of  them,  but  that  was  all,  and  he  did  not  hesitate  to  say 
positively  that  they  were  not  Whistlers.  His  idea  at  the  time  was 
that  they  might  be  by  Greaves  from  whom  they  were  said  to  have 
come,  together  with  a  packet  of  Whistler's  letters  to  him  and  his 
mother,  and  that  the  mistake  might  have  arisen  from  careless 
cataloguing.  Some  were  signed  by  a  Butterfly  which  was  not 
convincing  enough  in  itself  to  stand  against  the  evidence  in  the 
drawings.  More  astonishing  were  the  paintings  presently  sub 
mitted  to  him. 

Thursday,  September  i$th,  1910.  Walter  Dowdeswell  wrote  to  me 
on  Tuesday  that  he  had  something  of  extraordinary  interest  to  put 
before  us,  and  would  we  be  in  town  in  two  weeks'  time.  I  wrote 
at  once  that  J.  was  sailing  for  New  York  on  Saturday,  couldn't  he 
put  the  something  before  us  at  once?  Yesterday  he  telegraphed 
asking  us  to  come  to-day  at  noon;  we  said  yes,  but  when  noon 
came  to-day,  J.  was  so  busy  I  went  alone.  Walter  Dowdeswell 
took  me  upstairs  into  the  front  room  on  the  first  floor — told  me  he 
had  something  by  way  of  a  sensation  for  me — that  in  our  Life  oj 
Whistler  we  referred  to  rolls  of  paintings  carried  off  at  the  time  of 
the  bankruptcy;  well,  some  of  those  had  been  brought  to  him,  they 
had  been  in  a  cellar  for  years;  a  most  romantic  story  altogether 
but  he  couldn't  tell  it  yet.  Then  he  took  me  into  a  part  of  the  back 
room  curtained  off,  where  the  window  is,  and  there  in  a  semicircle 
were  some  ten  or  twelve  canvases  he  said  were  Whistlers,  most  of 
them  nocturnes  and  in  the  centre  a  full  length  portrait  of  a  small 
boy  in  blue  sailor  dress.  The  nocturnes  were  almost  all  of  the 
Battersea  shore,  but  there  was  one  something  like  Mrs.  Potter 
Palmer's,  one  with  a  few  figures  in  the  foreground,  and  one  in  a 
1900]  I25 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

gold,  grey,  and  brown  scheme.  Several  looked  to  me  far  too  vivid 
and  blue  and  hard  for  Whistler,  but  Dowdeswell  said  all  had  been 
in  a  shocking  bad  condition  and  had  had  to  be  cleaned  and  restored 
so  that  the  vividness  and  hardness  might  be  the  restorer's.  Then 
he  brought  in  one  after  another,  and  these  were  finer:  a  West 
minster;  a  large  greenish-blue  Battersea  with  wide  foreground  of 
water  and  the  bridge  in  the  distance  to  the  right;  another  Batter- 
sea,  apparently,  with  a  big  red-gold  moon  rising  over  the  houses 
to  the  left;  a  grey  stretch  of  river  and  banks  with  a  little  white 
yacht  stranded  in  the  foreground;  there  was  also  a  little  interior, 
a  woman,  with  black  hair  done  up  high  on  her  head,  wearing  a  grey 
dress,  standing  in  front  of  a  Japanese  screen,  a  mantelpiece  not 
unlike  the  mantelpiece  in  The  Little  White  Girl  behind  it,  not  par 
ticularly  good  but  the  skirt  was  absolutely  the  Whistler  of  The  Six 
Projects:  evidently  a  study  of  Miss  Spartali  for  La  Princesse  du 
Pays  de  la  Porcelaine.  None  of  these  were  signed.  There  was  also 
in  the  front  room  a  full  length  of  a  lady  in  brown  velvet,  with  white 
lace  fichu  and  white  lace  collar,  standing,  her  face  in  profile  to  the 
right,  her  golden  hair  in  a  coil  with  a  gold  band  about  it  and  in  her 
hand,  held  a  little  out  in  front  of  her,  a  bit  of  fine  linen  embroidery 
in  a  long  narrow  piece  hanging,  and  the  hand  beautifully  drawn. 
If  by  Whistler,  a  perfect  knock  down  for  Kenyon  Cox  and  all  the 
other  fools  who  said  he  couldn't  draw  a  hand.  A  gold  buckle 
fastens  the  dress  at  the  side.  The  pose  is  like  Whistler,  the  painting 
of  lace  and  embroidery  fine,  but  the  head  is  too  sharply  cut  out 
from  the  canvas  to  be  like  his  work,  though  something  like  the 
Rosa  Corder,  and  the  treatment  is  still  more  unlike,  though  all 
this  may  be  the  restorer.  On  the  left  about  the  centre  of  the  canvas 
is  a  little  oblong  panel  with  a  W.  in  white  sketched  in  like  the  begin 
ning  of  a  Butterfly,  but  so  bright  that  it  knocks  the  whole  picture 
to  pieces.  Probably  this  too  is  the  restorer.  There  was  also  a 
long  ray  of  light,  quite  out  of  tone,  apparently  the  fold  of  a  screen, 
against  which  the  model  was  standing.  Old  Dowdeswell  and  the 
other  brother,  Charles,  joined  us,  in  a  great  state  of  excitement. 
The  old  man — they  say  aged  eighty — had  come  up  to  town  on 
purpose.  They  felt  that  we  ought  to  have  the  first  chance  to  see 
126  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

these  things,  our  book  was  so  wonderful,  no  one  knew  better  than 
they  the  difficulty  to  write  about  such  a  man  and  we  had  given 
such  a  true  impression  of  him.  ...  I  went  back  with  J.  at  three. 
He  agreed  very  much  with  me,  didn't  believe  in  the  very  clear 
vivid  blue  nocturnes,  though  the  restorer  might  be  to  blame;  he 
had  nG  doubt  of  the  Westminster,  the  green-blue  Battersea,  the 
bigger  one  with  moon  (there  are  two  of  this  subject);  the  grey- 
brown  one;  the  one  with  figures;  the  one  like  Mrs.  Potter  Palmer's; 
and  perhaps  one  or  two  others;  was  doubtful  of  the  little  sketch 
for  the  Princesse  and  Walter  Dowdeswell  admitted  part  of  the 
screen  had  been  repainted;  was  more  sceptical  about  boy  and  lady 
in  brown. 

At  last  Walter  Dowdeswell  told  the  story.  A  lady  who  brings 
them  things  occasionally,  told  them  of  rolls  which  she  had  bought 
for  nothing  from  a  second-hand  book-seller  for  the  sake  of  one  old 
English  picture  which  she  recognized  for  what  it  Was  and  sold  to 
somebody  in  Munich.  The  Dowdeswells  looked  over  the  rolls. 
The  paintings  were  shockingly  dirty  but  they  saw  passages  that 
were  unmistakably  Whistler  and  they  bought  them  and  she  brought 
more  which  they  bought  too;  they  have  about  fifty  in  all;  and> 
really,  it  was  difficult  to  know  how  to  pay  her  for  she  didn't  know 
the  value  and  asked  nothing,  and  they  knew  the  value  and  felt 
they  should  pay  her  more  than  she  asked,  and  the  end  was  she 
felt  as  if  they  had  made  her  fortune  for  her,  though  I  gathered 
that  her  eyes  were  enough  opened  to  make  them  pay  more  for  the 
second  than  the  first  lot.  When  he  had  finished  J.  said  he  knew  that 
second-hand  dealer,  his  place  was  in  Holborn.  No,  Dowdeswell 
said.  Then  New  Oxford  Street,  he  was  not  quite  sure  which.  Yes, 
said  Dowdeswell.  Spencer,  said  J.  Yes,  said  Dowdeswell.  So  it 
is  the  shop  where  Elmer  Adler  last  summer  found  the  Whistler 
charcoal  drawings  and  spoke  of  rolls  of  things  being  there.  It 
looks  as  if  the  whole  business  might  come  from  Greaves.  In  the 
end  Walter  Dowdeswell  took  us  to  a  man,  in  a  remote  part  of 
Camden  Town,  who  is  restoring  a  few.  There  were  so  many  they 
have  been  given  to  different  restorers.  It  was  like  the  house  of  a 
little  cheap  dressmaker  with  horrible  pictures  on  the  wall  and  orna- 
[1900  127 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

ments  that  gave  the  man  away,  J.  suggested  afterwards,  like 
Whistler's  "little  something  on  the  mantelpiece."  He  had  two 
full  lengths:  one  of  a  woman,  middle-aged  with  black  hair  drawn 
rather  tightly  back,  in  a  white  muslin  gown,  date  I  should  say  the 
Sixties,  standing  against  a  white  background  with  at  the  bottom  a 
low  dado  of  blue-and-white  (tiles  or  matting)  with  a  long  green 
stroke  of  the  brush  on  one  side  and  two  touches  of  blue  on  the 
other,  very  Whistler,  and  not  much  tampered  with  by  the  restorer 
though  he  was  thinking  of  cleaning  away  the  strokes  of  green  and 
blue.  The  other  was  a  full-length  of  a  lady  in  blue,  carried  much 
further.  Her  hair  is  golden,  worn  in  a  fringe  on  the  forehead,  the 
face  characteristic  of  Whistler,  though  the  restorer — the  damned 
fool  J.  says — wanted  to  clean  the  character,  which  he  called  dirt, 
out.  The  dress  has  a  quilted  under  petticoat  in  front,  the  basque 
is  long  and  pointed,  there  is  a  little  puff  at  the  top  of  the  sleeve, 
the  hand,  unfinished,  hangs  at  the  side  (the  figure  is  seen  in  profile) 
and  there  are  soft  white  muslin  frills  at  the  neck.  It  seems  that 
the  bottom  of  the  canvas  was  in  tatters  or  "  ribbons,"  Dowdeswell 
said.  The  restorer  has  not  only  mended  it,  but  touched  it  with 
dabs  of  crude  blue  that  knocks  the  whole  thing  out  of  tone,  because 
he  says  there  wasn't  any  paint  there,  and  J.  thinks  he  must  have 
done  a  good  deal  of  repainting  to  the  gown.  J.  wonders  if  it  pos 
sibly  might  be  the  remains  of  the  portrait  of  Mrs.  Mitford  (Lady 
Redesdale)  and  Dowdeswell  will  find  out.  There  was  also  a  grey 
day,  with  figures  and  the  plumbago  works  of  Battersea  on  the 
opposite  shore — the  middle  distance  was  absurd,  and  not  Whistler. 
A  Cremorne  and  a  grey  day  with  white  blossoms  were  either  not 
Whistler  or  entirely  repainted  by  the  fool  restorer,  and  they  sug 
gested  that  those  already  at  Dowdeswells  may  possibly  be  genuine 
and  have  passed  through  the  same  treatment.  Altogether  it  was 
an  interesting  afternoon.  There  is  no  question  that  things  did 
disappear  at  the  time  of  the  bankruptcy  and  auction,  that  there  is 
comparatively  little  to  represent  some  ten  years  or  so  of  Whistler's 
work,  and  it  is  just  possible  that  these  rolls  of  paintings  may  be  the 
explanation.  They  may  have  come  from  Greaves,  from  whom 
Spencer  had  letters  and  those  charcoal  drawings.  From  Spencer 
128  [1900 


STUDY  OF  CARLYLE  ON  BACK  OF  CANVAS 

OIL 

Signed  by  Greaves 
In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Dowdeswell  and  Dowdesvvell 


HEAD  OF  CARLYLE 

OIL 

By  Whistler 
In  the  possession  of  Burton  Mansfield,  Esq. 


THE  GREAVES 

direct,  Dowdeswell  had  bought  for  twenty  guineas  a  package 
of  letters  all  written  as  testimonials  for  Howell:  one  signed  by 
Whistler,  one  by  Millais,  one  by  Rossetti.  I  sent  Dowdeswell 
the  addresses  of  Alan  Cole,  Mrs.  Thynne,  and  Greaves  who,  we  told 
him,  could  identify  the  pictures  better  than  anybody,  as  they 
must  all  date  back  to  before  1879  and  few  remain  who  knew 
Whistler  and  his  studio  at  that  time,  except  Alexander,  Rawlinson, 
and  perhaps  Mrs.  Whistler.  Among  the  other  canvases  being 
restored  is  a  Carlyle,  just  sketched  in,  a  little  different  from  the 
picture,  Carlyle  wearing  his  hat.  And  I  should  have  said  that 
there  is  a  sketch  of  Carlyle  on  the  back  of  the  gold-brown  nocturne 
and  a  sketch  of  sails  on  the  back  of  another.  There  is  also  at 
another  restorer's  a  full  length  of  a  boy  in  white  shirt.  Dowdeswell 
says  he  is  not  paying  Spencer  for  the  letters  until  Spencer  gives 
him  some  clue  to  the  history  of  the  pictures. 

Friday,  September  i6th,  1910.  J.  on  his  way  to  the  Consulate 
taking  out  his  papers  on  going  to  America,  stopped  at  Spencer's 
where  he  encountered  the  clerk  who  had  come  down  here  with  the 
signed  etching  that  wasn't  by  Whistler.  J.  didn't  know  whether 
he  knew  him.  He  could  get  nothing  out  of  the  clerk  who  said  he 
must  wait  for  Mr.  Spencer.  In  the  meantime  J.  discovered  the 
print  of  Drouet,  which  seemed  all  right,  and  a  Fulham.  When  J. 
talked  vaguely  about  there  being  piles  of  things  in  an  upper  story 
and  an  early  English  landscape  some  one  wanted  him  to  look  at, 
Mr.  Spencer  knew  nothing.  And  it  now  occurs  to  J.  that  when 
Adler  was  here  and  told  him  of  the  piles  of  stuff  at  Spencer's,  very 
likely  Dowdeswell's  "find"  was  there,  and  that  now  even  Spencer 
smells  a  rat.  He  said  he  was  too  busy  to  go  into  things,  he  loved 
pictures  but  the  place  was  a  book  warehouse,  and  he  did  not  know 
what  he  had,  which  is  terribly  evident.  But  we  must  get  at  the 
bottom  of  this  story.  On  looking  in  our  Whistler  this  morning, 
at  the  reproduction  of  The  Music  Room,  it  struck  me  that  Lady 
Haden,  as  you  see  her  in  the  mirror,  is  like  the  portrait  of  the 
lady  in  white  Dowdeswell  showed  us  at  the  restorer's  yesterday. 
Also  the  book  recalls  to  us  that  Redesdale  described  Whistler  as 
1900]  129 

9 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

slashing  the  portrait  of  his  wife  and  treating  other  pictures  in  the 
same  way  when  threatened  by  bailiffs.  At  this  period,  Howell 
was  much  involved  with  Whistler,  he  was  also  on  the  Bankruptcy 
Committee.  These  things  reappearing  with  the  bundle  of  testi 
monials  makes  one  wonder  if,  perhaps,  all  these  pictures  came, 
directly  or  indirectly,  from  Howell  or  his  heirs.  Miss  Chambers 
would  never  say.  In  the  afternoon  J.  dropped  in  at  DowdeswelPs 
again,  more  particularly  to  represent  what  a  mess  the  restorer  is 
making  of  the  lady  in  blue  and  to  beg  Dowdeswell  not  to  have 
anything  more  done  to  the  canvases.  A  number  of  others  had 
come  from  the  restorer's  in  the  meanwhile — several  nocturnes  and 
one,  evidently  from  his  Lindsey  Row  window,  of  the  shore  with  a 
man,  as  evidently  Howell,  walking  with  a  group  of  women — unmis 
takably  "The  Cock  and  his  Hens,"  as  Whistler  used  to  describe 
Howell.  They  hope  to  have  more  before  J.  goes. 

Saturday,  September  ijih.  A  telegram  from  Dowdeswell  asking 
us  to  call  before  one  and  he  could  show  us  more  pictures 
back  from  the  liners.  I  was  just  off  to  Harpenden  to  see  Mrs. 
Arthur  Tomson  and  J.  had  to  go  alone.  The  Dowdeswells  took 
him  upstairs  again  into  their  front  room  and  there  were  four  or 
five  more  nocturnes  which  had  just  been  lined,  or  rather  two 
nocturnes  and  three  grey  days,  small.  One  nocturne  was  probably 
an  early  one  and  first  J.  thought  it  was  the  railway  bridge  at 
Battersea  with  lights,  but  behind  it  there  was  something  that 
looked  like  a  hillside  so  it  may  have  been  somewhere  else.  The 
moon  was  outside  of  the  picture  but  there  were  lights  on  the 
clouds  at  the  top,  on  the  hillside  and  a  long  reflection  on  the  water 
which  the  imbeciles  took  for  a  crack  and  were  on  the  point  of  filling 
up,  and  it  took  J.  almost  half  an  hour  to  convince  them  that  they 
were  fools  and  were  doing  their  best  to  ruin  the  pictures.  Another 
was  old  Battersea  Bridge  from  his  window,  very  like  the  one  owned 
by  Pope;  in  fact,  it  may  be  another  canvas  of  the  same  subject 
which  he  never  went  on  with;  though  as  the  houses  in  the  back 
ground  are  different  it  might  be  Putney  Bridge  done  in  the  same 
way.  But  it  was  blocked  in  in  solid  masses  of  red,  evidently  with 
130  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

the  intention  of  painting  the  light  through  the  piers  afterwards. 
It  was  painted  in  a  reddish-brown,  really  just  rubbed  in.  Another 
was  a  steamboat  coming  up  the  river  and  leaving  a  white  line  of 
foam  right  along  either  shore.  These  two  long  lines  of  white  made 
a  curious  composition.  There  were  also  one  or  two  unfinished  and 
of  no  importance.  The  Dowdeswells  insisted  on  taking  J.  off  to 
lunch  at  the  Cafe  Royal  and  talked  for  hours.  Coming  back  after 
a  long  consultation  they  decided  to  show  him  another  which  they 
said  they  had  been  afraid  to  all  along.  Lunch  seemed  to  give  them 
courage.  They  produced  a  full-length  canvas  rolled  up,  and  spread 
it  out  on  the  floor.  It  was  ragged,  having  been  pulled  off  the 
stretcher,  and  was  the  usual  sort  of  Whistler  early  canvas  or  rather 
cloth.  It  represented  a  woman  seated  in  a  deep  window  seat 
holding  her  hands,  very  badly  painted,  and  a  book  in  her  lap. 
All  the  details  of  the  window  and  the  wainscotting  painted  black 
agree  with  descriptions  of  the  room.  The  woman  had  yellowish 
hair.  J.  thinks  it  is  most  likely  Tinnie  Greaves,  at  least  it  has  a 
suggestion  of  Tinnie  Greaves  as  she  is  to-day.  She  is  dressed  in 
white  and  the  Dowdeswells  raved  over  the  painting  of  some  of 
the  lace.  The  work  is  full  of  brush  marks,  especially  under  the 
chin  where  there  was  a  great  swab  of  reflected  high  light.  Through 
the  window  Battersea  Church  and  the  mills  are  seen,  painted  as 
hard  as  nails,  though  the  water  and  sky  are  good.  Of  course  the 
Greaves  may  have  done  this,  and  Whistler  tinkered  at  it.  On  the 
back  is  another  full-length  of  a  woman  standing,  or  two  twisted 
figures:  the  first  evidently  wore  a  big  brown  hat  and  a  brown  cloak 
trimmed  with  fur,  with  a  great  swob  of  a  hand  just  rubbed  in  hang 
ing  down  in  front.  On  top  of  this  was  the  head  of  a  woman  with 
florid  complexion  and  red  hair,  wearing  a  little  round  black  hat: 
without  doubt  Jo.  This  is  painted  right  over  the  head  and  hat  of 
the  other  figure,  or  else  the  head  is  changed.  The  bust  is  absolutely 
gone,  nothing  but  dirt  and  rags  and  the  liner  said  it  was  impossible 
to  do  anything  with  it  unless  it  was  lined.  J.  suggested  to  put 
canvas  round  the  edges,  he  said  that  would  tear,  and  J.  said  then 
he  had  only  to  put  it  between  glass.  They  will  probably  ruin  the 
whole  thing.  The  talk  went  on  from  twelve  to  five. 
1900]  131 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Monday,  September  igth.  To  the  restorer's  with  Dowdeswell. 
There  we  saw  first  a  large  full-length  of  a  small  boy,  standing  about 
the  centre  of  the  canvas,  against  a  screen  a  little  higher  than  him 
self  with  green  frame  and  white  panels.  He  is  seen  in  profile,  his 
hair  is  yellow  and  worn  in  a  fringe  over  his  forehead,  he  wears  a 
white  muslin  shirt  and  white  muslin  breeches,  low  black  shoes, 
and  stockings  with  black  and  white  horizontal  stripes.  The  pose 
is  childlike  and  simple  and  full  of  charm,  the  face  delicate,  the  figure 
not  carried  as  far  as  the  screen.  On  the  floor  is  black-and-white 
matting,  there  is  a  low  wainscotting  painted  green,  and  in  the 
upper  part  of  the  canvas,  to  the  right  and  above  the  screen,  is  a 
print  apparently  of  Battersea,  with  a  wide  white  mount  and  a 
narrow  black  frame.  It  is  one  of  the  best  of  the  things  we  have 
yet  seen.  The  restorer  said  it  was  covered  over  with  gum  when 
it  came  to  him,  which  certainly  agrees  with  the  description  of 
Whistler's  treatment  of  his  pictures  at  the  time  of  the  bankruptcy. 
On  a  smaller  canvas  was  a  three-quarter  length  of  a  lady  in  white, 
the  dress  in  the  fashion  of  the  Sixties.  She  is  standing  in  the  centre 
of  the  canvas,  turned  full  face,  she  is  dark,  her  short  upper  lip 
shows  her  teeth,  and  her  black  hair  is  rolled  up  on  the  top  of  her 
head  somewhat  in  the  fashion  of  the  little  figure  in  grey  before  the 
screen,  the  study  for  La  Princesse,  which  Dowdeswell  showed  us 
the  first  day.  Her  arms  hang  at  her  sides  and  around  the  wrists 
are  curious  deep  cuffs  or  wristbands  of  some  thicker  and  heavier 
white  muslin.  She  stands  against  a  greenish-black  curtain,  rather 
elaborately  finished  in  comparison  with  the  figure  which  is  not 
carried  very  far,  and  the  face  which  is  hardly  more  than  rubbed  in. 
This  is  much  less  interesting.  It  might  be  one  of  the  Greek  group 
of  his  friends,  an  lonides  or  a  Spartali.  There  was  also  a  small, 
slight  sketch  of  a  woman  in  blue  (oils)  that  might  have  been  a 
study  for  the  big  portrait:  there  is  the  blue  gown,  the  pointed 
basque,  the  puffed  sleeves,  only  the  figure  seems  to  have  a  blue 
cloak  over  the  left  arm. 

Tuesday,  November,  1st  1910.  Dowdeswell  showed  me  to-day  a 
canvas,  rather  small,  that  was  in  too  shocking  a  condition  to  be 
132  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

restored.  It  was  the  figure  of  a  woman  in  blue  drapery,  standing, 
in  the  back-ground  blue  lines  which  might  have  been  lines  of  the 
railing  of  a  balcony  or  of  a  painted  frieze.  There  were  great  dabs 
of  paint,  as  if  put  on  with  a  thick  brush,  across  the  figure,  the  whole 
canvas  was  dirty  and  grimy,  and  ragged  at  the  edges  where  it  had 
been  torn  from  the  stretcher. 

These  notes  give  our  impressions  at  the  time  of  the  remarkable 
collection  of  canvases  bought  by  the  Dowdeswells  from  Madame 
Frida  Strindberg,  the  lady  of  whom  they  spoke  in  their  story  of 
the  transaction.  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler,  Mr.  Alan  S.  Cole,  Mr.  Heine- 
mann,  Robert  Ross,  Lord  Redesdale,  the  Ways,  to  whom  the  can 
vases  were  submitted,  were  bewildered,  certain  that  some  were 
Whistler's,  uncertain  about  others,  struck  as  we  were  by  the  differ 
ence  in  quality,  many  of  the  paintings  being  as  commonplace  as 
many  were  masterly.  The  collection  as  a  whole  was  fine  enough 
for  T.  R.  Way  to  write  afterwards  to  the  Dowdeswells  to  congratu 
late  them  on  their  Whistlers.  Other  rolls  were  sold  to  Mr.  William 
Marchant,  others  offered  to  Ernest  G.  Brown,  with  letters  accept 
ing  Whistler's  invitations  to  his  Sunday  breakfasts.  A  canvas  or 
two  passed  into  the  hands  of  Messrs.  Reinhardt.  All  came  from  the 
shop  of  Mr.  Spencer  who  announced  that  he  had  also  a  bundle  of 
Whistler's  old  brushes  and  had  already  sent  Whistler  relics  to 
America.  The  condition  of  the  canvases  before  the  restorer  had 
touched  them  naturally  interested  us,  as  it  did  the  Dowdeswells, 
for  they  were  exactly  as  T.  R.  Way  had  already,  and  now  again, 
described  the  canvases  bought  by  his  father  when  he  served  with 
Howell  and  Leyland  on  the  Committee  of  Examiners  to  settle  up 
Whistler's  affairs  at  the  bankruptcy.  For  a  guinea  old  Way  pur 
chased  Whistler's  unfinished  canvases  which  were  rubbish  to  the 
auctioneer.  Way's  story  was  that  Whistler  told  him  to  take  the 
rolls,  Whistler's  that  he  asked  Way  to  purchase  them  and  keep  them 
for  him.  Years  afterwards  Whistler  claimed  them.  Way  refused  to 
return  them  all.  And  that  was  the  end.  When  Whistler  thought 
his  confidence  had  been  abused,  he  could  say  things  that  hurt, 
and  now  he  said  it  was  only  what  was  to  be  expected,  his  mistake 
had  been  to  associate  with  tradesmen,  and  he  would  have  nothing 
more  to  do  with  father  or  son.  That  Whistler  in  his  difficulties 
asked  people  he  thought  he  could  trust  to  bring  things  from  the 
White  House,  we  know  for  we  have  seen  his  letter  to  Walter 
Greaves,  telling  Greaves  to  go  to  the  White  House  and  take  for  his 
own  etchings  any  of  the  Japanese  paper  he  liked,  though  some 
1900]  133 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

must  be  left.  That  other  things  disappeared,  we  also  know,  for 
we  have  also  seen  his  letters  from  Venice  to  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler 
begging  her  and  the  Doctor  to  hunt  up  missing  canvases,  especially 
the  Lobsters  and  Mount  Ararat  caricatures  of  Leyland,  a  Blue  Girl, 
a  version  of  The  Three  Girls.  He  sent  an  urgent  message  to  Way 
and  to  Eldon,  then  much  in  the  studio,  imploring  them  to  trace 
these  caricatures  which  he  valued  and  which  he  feared  Howell 
and  Leyland  had  hatched  a  plot  to  destroy.  Of  much  that  went 
on  during  the  bankruptcy  proceedings,  evidently  he  had  no  knowl 
edge.  At  less  agitated  times  Whistler,  though  usually  over  careful 
of  his  work,  could  be  inexplicably  careless,  leaving  his  canvases 
here,  there,  and  everywhere.  After  his  death  W.  C.  Alexander 
returned  to  Miss  Philip  paintings  and  drawings  which  had  been  in 
the  Campden  Hill  house  ever  since  Whistler  stayed  there  to  paint 
Miss  May  Alexander.  We  have  spoken  of  the  things  that  turned 
up  at  Howell's  house  in  Selsey  Bill.  T.  R.  Way  remembered  beau 
tiful  seas  painted  in  the  Channel  Islands — "most  interesting  and 
unlike  anything  else  he  had  done" — which  vanished.  Towards 
the  end,  the  disappearance  of  work  from  his  Paris  studio  worried 
him  to  distraction  when  his  health  depended  upon  his  not  worrying 
at  all.  The  bankruptcy  was  the  opportunity  for  the  greatest  care 
lessness  and,  apparently,  the  greatest  advantage  was  taken  of  it. 
Some  years  later  on,  Thomas  Way  gave  him  back  one  roll  of  large 
six-foot  full-length  portraits:  the  Sir  Henry  Cole,  a  Miss  May 
Alexander,  three  Miss  Leylands.  One  of  these  three  is  probably 
the  painting  in  the  Brooklyn  Museum.  Of  another  in  riding  habit, 
a  drawing  reproduced  in  M.  Duret's  Whistler,  T.  R.  Way  said 
was  a  sketch,  though  it  looks  to  us  more  like  the  Mrs.  Cassatt. 
Other  rolls  which  Way  had  divided  with  his  son,  they  refused  to 
give  up.  Out  of  these  came  an  unfinished  Valparaiso  now  in  the 
National  Collection;  a  Cremorne  now  at  the  Metropolitan;  a  nude; 
a  portrait  of  Miss  Leyland,  a  Blue  Girl,  in  such  a  state  that  only 
the  flowers  in  one  corner  could  be  saved — a  fragment  Freer  bought; 
the  Lobsters  and  Mount  Ararat  which  Thomas  Way  was  asked  to 
trace  but  apparently  could  not  and  we  believe  they  too  were  sold 
to  Freer.  T.  R.  Way  told  us  that  Whistler,  looking  over  the  can 
vases,  saw  on  one,  emerging  from  the  muck  with  which  it  was 
covered,  two  black  slippers  against  a  white  ground,  and  recognized 
the  feet  of  a  White  Girl  shown  in  his  1874  exhibition  in  Pall  Mall. 
That  made  Way  set  to  work  to  clean  and  repaint  it.  For  long 
this  portrait,  for  which  he  thought  Jo  must  have  posed,  hung  in 
his  father's  house  in  Brunswick  Square.  Whistler  saw  it  there 
after  the  repainting,  objected,  and  Way  cleaned  off  his  own  work. 

134  [1900 


WHITE  GIRL.    NO  IV. 

OIL 

In  the  possession  of  John  F.  Braun,  Esq. 


SKETCH  OP  SAME 
Attributed  to  Whistler 

CHALK 

The  Way  Collection 


THE  GREAVES 

"The  over-painting  was  removed  with  the  painter's  knowledge," 
according  to  a  note  in  the  catalogue  when  Way  sent  it  to  the  Fair 
Women  show  held  in  London  in  1910.  "A  sadly  battered  ghost 
of  a  Whistler,"  was  E.'s  impression;  "a  peculiarly  poor  Whistler, 
a  shadow  and  not  significant  at  that,"  was  the  prevailing  opinion 
among  the  critics.  It  was  again  repainted  by  T.  R.  Way,  sold  by 
his  sisters  after  old  Way's  death,  brought  to  New  York,  bought 
by  Mrs.  Thaw,  from  whom  the  portrait,  or  what  is  left  of  it,  passed 
into  the  possession  of  Mr.  John  F.  Braun  of  Philadelphia.*  That 
no  Thames  nocturnes  were  in  his  father's  rolls  had  always  been  a 
wonder  to  T.  R.  Way,  he  wrote  to  a  London  paper  after  the  dis 
covery  of  the  rolls  at  Spencer's.  And  it  is  astonishing,  for  during 
the  years  when  these  unfinished  portraits  were  begun,  Whistler 
gave  as  much  time  to  the  river  as  to  his  sitters. 
The  canvases  in  the  Dowdeswell  rolls  were,  many  of  them,  in  as 
desperate  a  state  and  were  restored  as  thoroughly.  Restoration 
usually  means  destruction.  It  is  worse  in  America  probably  than 
anywhere  else.  The  Lange  Leizen  in  the  Johnson  Collection  is  a 
wreck.  Almost  every  picture  in  many  American  collections  has 
been,  or  will  be,  ruined  by  cleaning.  Everything  is  reduced  to  a 
ruinous  level  of  freshness  by  rubbing  and  scouring  and  scrubbing. 
The  bloom  of  time  is  removed  for  the  benefit  of  the  American 
collector  who  cannot  understand  it — or  art  either — and  if  this 
is  not  enough  the  works  are  entirely  repainted.  It  is  not  so  long 
ago  that  J.  was  dismayed  by  seeing  an  American  restorer  spit 
on  his  thumb  and  rub  with  all  his  might  the  glaze  off  a  very  old 
Master.  It  looked  new  enough  in  all  conscience  and  perhaps,  with 
further  rubbing  a  picture  by  James  Montgomery  Flagg  or  Charles 
Dana  Gibson  appeared  under  it.  On  another  occasion  J.  caught  a 
dealer  with  a  rough  cloth  endeavoring  to  rub  the  whole  face  in 
another  portrait  up  to  the  high  light  on  the  chin,  saying  the  rest 
of  the  face  must  be  dirty.  If  in  fifty  years  any  old  pictures  are 
left  in  America,  it  will  be  because  they  have  not  been  tampered 
with  by  dealers,  restorers  and  collectors.  A  Whistler  factory  is 
working  overtime  as  every  American  collector  now  has  to  have  a 
Whistler  and  they  are  all  signed,  but  scarce  one  is  by  the  artist. 
In  Chicago,  in  the  autumn  of  1911,  J.  was  shown  a  marine,  one  of 
the  canvases  bought  by  the  Dowdeswells  from  Madame  Strindberg 
and  sold  by  them  to  another  dealer.  Everybody  who  saw  it 
declared  it  a  genuine  W7histler.  The  fact  coming  to  the  knowledge  of 
Madame  Strindberg,  led  to  trouble  over  the  question  of  payment, 
and  she  demanded  all  the  canvases  back  from  the  Dowdeswells 

*  NOTE — Mr.  Braun  has  had  Way's  and  probably  later  painting  cleaned  off, 
and  in  this  case  the  picture  really  has  been  restored. 

1900]  135 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

including  this  marine  which  had  passed  into  the  possession  of 
Messrs.  Reinhardt.  The  Dowdeswells  then  withdrew  their  collec 
tion  from  exhibition  and  sale. 

Up  to  this  time  we  had  heard  the  name  of  Walter  Greaves  only 
once  in  connection  with  the  rolls — when  Messrs.  Dowdeswell  told 
us  of  one  roll  offered  them  but  refused,  in  which  they  came  upon 
"strange  things"  signed  Walter  Greaves.  Now,  however,  his  name 
was  to  become  a  nine  days'  wonder.  Mr.  Marchant  found  the 
canvases  he  bought  in  the  same  deplorable  condition,  dirty  and 
neglected,  and  certainly  those  he  showed  J.  were  about  as  bad  as 
they  could  be.  Mr.  Spencer  gave  an  ingenious  explanation  of  the 
holes  in  some  of  them.  Whistler,  when  he  could  not  afford  new 
canvases,  bought  old  paintings,  so  old  that  they  sometimes  devel 
oped  holes.  Then  he  would  tell  Greaves  to  paint  a  tiny  frame  round 
the  hole,  and  the  device  could  be  noticed  in  one  of  the  portraits 
by  Greaves.  Ingenious  but,  we  fancy,  Mr.  Spencer's  own.  Like 
the  Dowdeswells,  Mr.  Marchant  had  the  canvases  restored.  Then 
he  looked  up  Greaves,  arranged  an  exhibition  in  the  Goupil  Gallery 
in  May,  1911,  sent  out  cards  for  a  show  by  "Walter  Greaves, 
Pupil  of  Whistler,"  and  published  a  catalogue.  The  card  attracted 
small  attention.  The  note  of  the  private  view  in  The  Journal  is: — 

Thursday,  May  fth,  ign.  In  the  afternoon  I  went  to  the  Goupil 
Gallery  to  see  the  Greaves  show.  It  is  given  in  the  largest  and 
smallest  of  the  rooms  on  the  first  floor.  In  the  small  room  are 
the  etchings  and  one  water-colour — the  etchings  reminiscent  of 
Whistler.  In  the  large  room,  the  paintings;  one  of  the  first,  a  large 
full-length  of  Miss  Alice  Greaves — "Tinnie" — in  blue  gown.  Oppo 
site  hangs  another  of  "Tinnie"  in  the  same  sort  of  a  gown  only  in 
black  and  white:  white  front  quilted  and  black  train.  The  Carlyle 
I  saw  in  the  Greaves'  house  is  there,  a  portrait,  small,  of  Walter 
Greaves,  and  a  still  smaller  one  of  Harry  Greaves.  The  rest  are 
almost  all  of  the  river  at  Chelsea,  streets  in  Chelsea,  and  Cremorne. 
It  seemed  to  me  easy  to  see  at  a  glance  which  were  the  pictures 
Greaves  painted  for  himself,  and  which  under  the  influence  of 
Whistler.  One  or  two  blue  Nocturnes  and  one  or  two  grey  Batter- 
sea  Bridges  were  obviously  slavish  attempts  at  imitation.  The 
things  that  were  entirely  his  own  struck  me  as  common  in  vision 
and  treatment.  I  met  first  Hind,  who  wanted  to  know  what  it 
136  [1900 


MRS.  A.  J.  CASSATT 

PEN-AND-INK 

In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 


BATTERSEA  BRIDGE 

OIL 

By  Whistler 
Tate   Gallery,   London 


PASSING  UNDER  OLD  BATTERSEA 
BRIDGE 

OIL 

By  Walter  Greaves 
From  the  N.  Y.  Herald 


THE  GREAVES 

meant,  and  it  was  too  direct  a  crib  from  Whistler.  Then  I  talked 
to  Marchant,  who  told  me  the  whole  thing  was  a  most  remarkable 
story.  Rolls  of  canvases  in  the  worst  state  he  had  ever  seen  can 
vases  in  were  brought  to  him,  he  had  one  or  two  cleaned  and  began 
to  see  things  in  them,  then  found  the  name  Greaves  on  one,  hunted 
him  up,  found  him  in  the  most  deplorable  condition  in  the  Fulham 
Road  house,  so  deplorable  that  he  sent  down  bits  of  furniture 
afterwards,  and  the  result  is  the  Exhibition.  It  is  an  extraordinary 
story  and  adds  to  the  mystery  of  the  Dowdeswell  rolls.  Then  I 
saw  Greaves,  who  was  jumpy.  He  told  me  Whistler  had  worked 
on  the  Carlyle,  had  come  in  to  see  him  and  his  brother  while  they 
were  doing  it  and  criticised  their  work.  They  had  painted  the 
mount  of  the  print  on  the  wall  white  and  he  said  it  would  never 
do  and  then  painted  it  grey  in  tone  with  the  wall.  He  said  also 
that  The  Balcony  and  one  or  two  others  were  painted  from 
Whistler's  window,  and  they  were  always  doing  them,  sometimes 
one  on  top  of  another.  The  one  of  Battersea  Bridge,  under  the  arch, 
to  which  he  refers  in  his  catalogue  he  said  he  and  his  brother  had 
done  and  then  Whistler  saw  it  and  said,  "why,  you  boys  have 
got  something  nice  there,"  and  after  that  he  painted  his  Battersea 
at  the  Tate.  It  was  private  view,  but  nobody  else  there  except 
two  men  and  two  women,  and  an  old  man  and  his  wife  with  whom 
Greaves  was  talking.  He  introduced  them  as  old  Chelsea  people, 
and  the  man  said  he  was  so  glad  to  meet  me,  he  was  a  great 
admirer  of  my  husband's  and  my  work,  he  knew  it — from  the 
illustrated  catalogues! 

The  catalogue  attracted  more  attention  than  the  card.  In  the 
Preface,  over  Greaves'  name,  it  was  stated  that  he  painted  Passing 
Under  Battersea  Bridge •,  which  was  signed  and  dated,  in  1862  and 
exhibited  it  the  same  year  in  the  International  Exhibition  at  South 
Kensington  where  for  several  years,  International  Exhibitions  of 
paintings  were  held.  This  was  proved  a  mistake,  as  no  pictures  by 
Greaves  were  shown  there  that  year.  Probably  only  a  few  peo 
ple  would  have  been  interested,  had  not  the  press  of  Great  Brit 
ain  in  the  meanwhile  broken  out  in  praise  of  the  unknown  pupil 
whom  Whistler  suppressed — the  pupil  who  was  the  master  from 
whom  Whistler  learned  everything.  The  Times  started  the  ball 
1900]  137 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

rolling  with  a  notice,  under  the  title  "An  Unknown  Master" — 
a  master  whose  naivete  was  so  different  from  the  "cosmopolitan 
cleverness"  of  Whistler,  who  was  the  British  De  Hoogh,  whose 
drawing  of  boats  had  never  been  surpassed,  whose  work,  indeed, 
bore  the  same  relation  to  Whistler  as  the  Giorgionesque  Titian  to 
Titian.  This  was  printed  on  May  4th.  It  was  enough.  The 
floodgates  opened.  Two  days  later  P.  G.  Konody  of  The  Daily 
Mail  was  asking  how  much  Whistler  owed  to  his  pupil,  and  on1 
every  side  critics  tumbled  over  each  other  in  their  eagerness  to 
overthrow  Whistler  and  set  up  Greaves  in  his  place.  Two  or  three 
kept  their  heads.  Robert  Ross  in  The  Morning  Post  saw  in  Greaves 
a  convenient  "New  Amico  di  Sandro"  E.  F.  Strange  in  The  West 
minster  Gazette  pointed  out  the  absurdity  of  it,  especially  so  soon 
after  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition.  But  they  were  exceptions. 
"Whistler  Dethroned"  was  typical  of  the  prevailing  headline 
which,  growing  bolder  in  America,  became  "Art  Tragedy  Shows 
Vanity  of  Whistler,"  "Now  Critics  are  Asking  Which  was  the 
Master?"  "Was  this  Artist  Whistler's  Ghost?"  "The  Crushed 
Genius,"  "The  Other  Whistler,"  "Casting  Whistler  in  the  Shade." 
British  criticism  decided  that  Whistler  was  artificial  compared  to 
Greaves,  that  Whistler  exploited  his  obscure  admirer,  that  Greaves 
was  the  first  to  paint  nocturnes,  that  he  accomplished  what 
Whistler  spent  his  life  trying  to  do,  that  it  looked  bad  for  Whistler, 
that  Whistler  was  at  last  exposed — and  a  jolly  good  thing  too! 
The  miserable  Yankee.  The  question  was  whether  a  shred  of 
Whistler's  reputation  would  be  left.  As  he  was  not  alive  to  defend 
himself,  there  was  the  end  of  the  Yankee. 

Marchant's  gallery  now  was  crowded.  Authorities  urged  the 
acquiring  of  at  least  one  Greaves  for  the  Tate,  the  voice  of  Sickert 
was  heard  crying  " Au  Louvre  with  Tinnie  Greaves."  Many 
paintings  and,  we  believe,  all  the  prints  were  sold.  Among  the 
purchasers  were  Sir  Hugh  Lane,  John,  Orpen,  Nicholson,  North- 
cliffe.  Robert  Ross,  who  gave  us  this  list,  suggested  that  Nicholson 
must  have  bought  his  just  to  prove  his  decency  in  not  minding 
the  way  Greaves  was  overshadowing  his  own  exhibition  in  another 
room,  Northcliffe  possibly  to  please  Konody,  his  critic  on  The 
Daily  Mail. 

It  was  absurd  and  preposterous,  and  might  have  been  ignored  like 
all  foolish  criticism  and  discoveries.  But  the  dates  in  the  catalogue 
were  used  by  the  critics  as  a  basis  of  fact  upon  which  to  build  up 
their  exaggerations,  especially  the  date  1862  on  Under  Batter  sea 
Bridge  which,  Greaves  claimed,  gave  Whistler  the  idea  for  his  Old 
Battersea  Bridge  now  in  the  Tate  Gallery.  It  was  an  extraordinary 

138  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

tale  for  this  meant  that  Greaves'  picture  was  painted  before 
Whistler  was  settled  in  his  first  Lindsey  Row  house  where  the 
Greaves  brothers  began  to  work  with  him,  and  that  Whistler 
borrowed  the  motive  about  ten  years  later.  It  was  the  more 
puzzling  because  few  could  look  at  the  picture  without  seeing  two 
distinct  qualities  of  work  in  it,  as  if  it  were  the  work  of  two  people 
or  two  periods.  Mr.  A.  S.  Hartrick  assured  us  that,  more 
curious  still,  if  examined  very  carefully  it  looked  as  if  a  piece  of 
canvas  had  been  added  where  "Greaves,  62"  was  signed — as  if 
the  grain  of  the  canvas  below  the  piece  ran  quite  differently, 
slanting,  while  the  grain  above  ran  almost  horizontally.  The 
matter  was  altogether  too  grave  to  be  allowed  to  drop  by  those 
who  cared  for  Whistler's  reputation.  This  was  why  J.,  Heinemann, 
Mr.  Cole,  Robert  Ross,  and  any  number  of  artists  began  to  make 
investigations.  It  was  discovered  not  only  that  Greaves'  dates 
were  inaccurate  but  that  the  preface  was  prepared  by  Mr.  Mar- 
chant  and  then  signed  by  Greaves.  J.  wrote  to  The  Times  which 
refused  to  publish  his  letter.  Then  Heinemann  wrote  and  his 
letter  was  published.  The  Times  critic,  ignoring  the  effect  of  his 
article,  washed  his  hands  of  the  whole  business.  He  had  praised 
Greaves  for  his  unlikeness,  not  his  likeness  to  Whistler,  he  said. 
But  J.,  in  the  meanwhile,  sent  his  letter  to  other  papers  which 
did  print  it.  Critics  began  to  waver.  Those  who  had  been  eager 
to  exalt  Greaves  began  to  talk  of  his  inexperience,  a  painter  tech 
nically  not  too  well  equipped.  One  went  to  the  length  of  saying 
the  Greaves  Bubble  had  Burst,  but  threatened  with  a  libel  case  ex 
plained  it  away.  The  preface,  we  think,  was  omitted  when  the  error 
of  date  was  pointed  out  and  proved.  Some  of  the  pictures,  it 
was  said,  were  withdrawn  from  sale  and  the  dates  removed  from 
some  of  the  canvases  and  some  of  the  entries  in  the  catalogue.  It 
was  Alan  S.  Cole  who  exposed  the  statement  in  the  Catalogue.  He 
was  referred  to  as  an  official  of  South  Kensington.  J.  found  him  in 
the  Athenaeum  Club,  they  visited  Marchant's  gallery,  and  they 
looked  up  a  South  Kensington  Catalogue  of  that  and  other  years. 
There  was  no  picture  by  Greaves  shown  in  1862  and  as  Cole  said, 
"my  father  thought  me  a  genius,  but  even  he  would  not  have 
chosen  me  as  art  director  at  the  age  of  sixteen."  Marchant  ad 
mitted  that  the  Introduction  to  the  Catalogue  was  not  written 
by  Greaves,  only  signed  by  him. 

The  collection  later  came  to  America,  heralded  by  a  pamphlet  in 
which  Mr.  Marchant  gave  his  statement  of  the  Greaves  affair, 
calling  it  A  reply  to  an  attack  on  a  -pupil  of  Whistler.  When  the 
pictures  were  shown  at  the  Cottier  Galleries,  New  York,  in  the 

1900]  139 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

winter  of  1912,  an  equally  misleading  introduction  or  preface  to 
the  American  Catalogue  was  concocted  by  Dr.  Christian  Brinton. 
It  was  a  wonderful  production,  beginning  in  the  G.  P.  R.  James 
manner:  "Shortly  before  noon  on  May  5th  last  there  slipped 
quietly  into  the  Goupil  Gallery  in  Regent  Street  a  timorous, 
unassuming  little  man,"  and  so  on  for  many  pages  in  which  Tinnie 
Greaves,  "fresh  as  a  flower,"  is  seen  going  to  Cremorne  Gardens 
in  Whistler's  company,  and,  with  her  sister — "these  wholesome, 
generous-hearted  English  girls" — helping  Whistler,  their  "deft 
and  willing  hands"  making  the  rugs  upon  which  his  models  posed 
— altogether  an  appeal  to  the  gallery  for  Dr.  Brinton  believed  it 
was  the  life  story  of  Greaves  that  had  gone  "straight  to  the  big 
responsive  heart  of  the  British  public."  It  would  have  been  only 
funny  had  not  Dr.  Brinton  re-echoed  the  London  critics,  their 
statements  and  conclusions  when  the  Greaves  folly  was  at  its  height. 
Unfortunately  for  him  and  the  owners  of  the  galleries,  J.  happened 
to  arrive  in  New  York  while  the  exhibition  was  being  held  and  he 
exposed  Dr.  Brinton's  mistakes.  The  pictures  were  disposed  of  at 
auction,  fetching  small  prices,  and  Greaves  has  not  often  been 
heard  of  since. 

Greaves,  after  the  show  in  London,  signed  we  believe  all  the  paint 
ings  and  those  owned  by  Dowdeswell  which,  as  we  suggested,  he 
was  asked  to  examine.  He  claimed  the  canvases  in  the  other  rolls. 
But  we  have  never  heard  that  he  explained  the  ragged  edges  or 
the  smudges  of  black  and  the  glue-like  substance  with  which  they 
were  defaced.  There  was  a  reason  in  Whistler's  case,  but  none  in 
his  that  we  know,  unless  the  faithful  pupil  felt  compelled  to  follow 
the  master  to  this  extreme  of  self-sacrifice.  Nor  did  he  explain  to 
what  extent  the  paintings  had  been  further  ruined  or  improved  by 
the  restorer.  We  saw  what  the  restorer  did  to  some  of  the  canvases 
that  came  out  of  Messrs.  Dowdeswell's  rolls,  and  Mr.  Kerr-Lawson 
(on  September  pth,  IQII)  gave  us  an  idea  of  the  restorer's  share  in 
others  out  of  Mr.  Merchant's  collection.  At  the  Greaves  show 
Lawson,  pointing  to  one  or  two  of  the  pictures,  said  they  looked 
as  if  Whistler  had  begun  but  not  finished  them,  had  thrown  them 
aside  until  the  canvas  was  all  cracked  and  dirty,  when  Greaves 
probably  came  along,  cleaned  them,  filled  up  the  cracks  and  re 
painted  them.  "O  no!"  said  the  assistant,  "it  wasn't  Greaves 
who  did  that,  it  was  the  restorer!"  At  the  International  Exhibition 
in  the  new  Grosvenor  Gallery,  in  1912 — J.  was  away  at  the  time — 
one  of  the  rooms,  with  its  gorgeous  rose  brocade  hangings,  was 
devoted  to  nocturnes  catalogued  as  Greaves  that  had  not  hitherto 
been  seen — a  curious  tribute  to  the  memory  of  Whistler.  They 

140  [1900 


THE  GREAVES 

made  the  same  impression  as  the  other  Greaves  collections,  though 
no  excitement  this  time  in  the  press.  The  tendency  was  to  dismiss 
them  as  "Whistlerian  exercises."  It  was  difficult  to  understand 
how  a  man  who  could  paint  some  canvases  of  utter  commonplace, 
could  paint  others  so  suggestive  and  beautiful  that  Whistler  would 
not  have  been  ashamed  to  sign  them.  At  the  private  view  they 
roused  small  interest  save  in  artists  who  delighted  in  the  beautiful 
nocturnes,  full  of  rare  Whistler  qualities;  while  an  official  in  the 
gallery,  jesting  at  his  friends'  bewilderment,  was  heard  to  ask 
if  they  had  been  to  "The  Whistler  Room."  Portraits  we  had 
seen  at  Dowdeswell's  were  hung  at  other  International  Exhibitions, 
when  The  Times  thought  they  were  hung  too  high  for  faces 
and  hands  to  be  examined,  that  they  were  subjects  rather  for  the 
archaeologist  and  the  historian,  as  if  the  critic  were  writing  of  an 
Old  Master  so  long  dead  that  only  paintings  remain  as  documentary 
evidence.  Later  a  number  of  full-length,  life-size  portraits  of 
Whistler  and  several  small  ones  turned  up,  some  of  them  bought 
by  the  Rosenbach  Company  of  Philadelphia.  One  was  sold  to 
Toledo,  one  to  the  business-like  directors  of  the  Pennsylvania 
Academy  of  the  Fine  Arts.  Before  they  left  England,  a  small 
half-length  was  purchased  for  the  gallery  at  Merthyr  Tydvil, 
Wales.  Had  Whistler  sat  for  them,  it  would  have  taken  years  of 
his  life  and  almost  all  are  in  the  supposed  costume  of  the  same 
period,  even  to  the  hat.  But  if  one  looks  up  the  portraits  of 
Whistler  with  Chase  and  Menpes  in  the  Eighties,  it  will  be  seen 
that  he  was  then  still  wearing  a  curly  brim  and  Chase  a  straight 
one.  According  to  Menpes,  when  Whistler  first  saw  Chase's  hat, 
he  said,  "Ha,  ha!  what  have  we  here?  This  is  good!  I  like  the 
lines  of  this  hat !  "  and  in  less  than  a  week  was  wearing  one  like 
it:  a  story  which  gives  the  date,  though  some  of  Greaves'  portraits 
are  dated  between  sixty-nine  and  seventy-six.  There  is  no  evidence 
of  Whistler  ever  having  posed  to  Greaves  at  all.  Whistler  never 
referred  to  having  posed,  none  of  these  pictures  was  ever  shown 
or  even  heard  of  during  his  lifetime  so  far  as  we  know,  though 
Greaves  told  us  that  Whistler  once  painted  Harry  Greaves  on  top  of 
a  moonlight.  Some  of  Greaves'  portraits  bear  a  striking  resemblance 
to  contemporary  photographs  and  the  caricatures  by  Spy  and  Ape. 
The  portraits  painted  on  the  walls  of  the  old  Streatham  Town  Hall 
by  the  two  brothers  are  similar  in  manner  and  treatment — the 
portraits  that  remain,  that  is.  Some  heads  had  been  carefully 
scraped  out  when  we  were  there,  among  them,  we  were  told,  a 
portrait  of  Whistler  and  another  of  Henry  Irving.  On  the  walls 
were  also  imitations  of  Chinese  decorations,  Albert  Moore  clas- 

1900]  141 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

sicisms  and  numerous  nocturnes,  rank  but  artless  imitations  of 
Whistler.  Whistler  knew  all  about  the  decorations,  was  the  first 
from  whom  we  heard  of  them.  A  correspondence  on  the  subject, 
published  in  the  London  Star,  was  sent  to  him  by  Mr.  D.  Croal 
Thomson,  and  in  acknowledging  it  Whistler  explained  that  the 
Greaves  were  his  pupils — more  his  pupils  than  any  others  had 
ever  been — this  was  in  1895;  they  were  full  of  talent,  he  wrote, 
they  had  had  no  other  master,  for  a  time  were  always  in  the  studio 
where  they  learnt  everything  they  knew.  The  critics  would  have 
given  the  public  the  impression  that  Whistler  had  not  allowed  his 
pupils  to  exhibit  during  his  lifetime — even  Tinnie  Greaves  said  so — 
had  deliberately  kept  them  in  the  background,  as  was  written  by 
one,  "on  the  principle  of  the  Turkish  Sultans  who  killed  off  their 
brothers  to  avoid  possible  rivals  for  the  throne."  With  his  later 
pupils  Whistler  stipulated  that  they  should  not  show  without  his 
permission,  a  condition  they  understood  if  critics  make  of  it  a 
crime.  Also,  he  wished  them  to  exhibit  as  his  pupils,  which  is 
always  done  in  France  where  students  look  upon  it  as  an  honour, 
not  a  hardship. 

But  the  irony  of  this  criticism  is  in  the  fact  that  the  downtrodden 
pupils  were  commissioned  to  decorate  a  Town  Hall,  and  did  so 
during  Whistler's  lifetime,  while  the  master  never  got  a  chance  to 
decorate  a  public  building — the  Boston  Library — until  too  late  to 
avail  himself  of  it.  How  then  did  Whistler  hold  back  his  pupils? 
Whistler  had  painted  no  nocturnes  in  1862,  when  Walter  Greaves 
was  at  first  said  to  have  exhibited  one,  nor  had  Whistler  influence 
in  any  exhibition  or  society  at  that  date.  Even  the  London  Times, 
though  at  first  it  refused  to  admit  that  its  critic  would  have  ruined 
Whistler  had  his  facts  been  correct,  collapsed,  and  so  did  the  rest 
of  the  British  press,  after  Heinemann  and  J.  exposed  Mr.  Glutton 
Brock's  rhapsodies  in  The  Times  and  the  mistaken  statements  in 
the  other  papers,  and  made  it  clear  it  was  a  question  not  of  relative 
quality  but  of  fact.  J.  said  at  the  time  he  had  no  quarrel  with 
Greaves  at  whose  success  he  was  delighted,  nor  with  Mr.  Marchant 
whom  he  considered  a  clever  dealer.  He  only  wanted  to  point 
out  the  error  in  the  dates  and  the  use  the  critics  made  of  it.  But, 
certainly,  had  there  been  a  scheme  for  the  boosting  of  Greaves 
and  the  discrediting  of  Whistler,  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  the 
critics  to  prove  Greaves  the  real  master  and  Whistler  merely  the 
pupil,  the  imitator,  the  pretender,  it  could  not  have  been  better 
arranged  nor  have  failed  more  completely. 

Mr.  Marchant  employed  Greaves  for  a  long  while  at  a  guinea  or  so 
a  week  which  he  paid  him  in  cash,  and  J.  has  seen  him  do  so,  for 

142  [1900 


PORTRAITS  OP  JAMES  McXEILL  WHISTLER 

OILS 
By  Walter  Greaves.     In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 


(See  page  141) 


SPY'S    CARICATURE    OF   WHISTLER 

LITHOGRAPH 

Published  in  Vanity  Fair 
(See  page  141) 


A    PORTRAIT    OF    WHISTLER 

OIL 

By  Walter  Greaves 
(See  page  141} 


THE  GREAVES 

the  poor  man  was  in  sore  straits.  Mr.  Marchant  also  gave  him  a 
studio  in  the  Howell  and  James  building,  and  rumours  went  about 
of  the  work  he  was  producing  there  to  the  wonder  of  some  of 
Mr.  Marchant's  other  artists  who  crowded  about  him  to  see  him 
paint.  Rothenstein  was  impressed  by  the  rare  passion  and  rever 
ence  of  his  work  and  the  entirely  new  note  running  through  all 
his  pictures.  Nicholson  stood  in  awe  of  his  marvellous  powers  as 
a  technician.  Walter  Sickert  proclaimed  him  a  great  master,  and 
they  all  showed  in  the  Goupil  Gallery.  It  was  to  the  credit  of 
Sargent  and  Alfred  East,  among  others,  that,  as  Robert  Ross 
reported,  they  were  "on  the  right  side."  We  never  went  to  this 
studio,  but  we  remember  Mr.  and  Mrs.  McLure  Hamilton  telling 
us  that  they  strayed  in  by  chance  when  looking  for  a  studio  adver 
tised  to  let  in  the  same  building,  and  found  Greaves,  rather  embar 
rassed  by  the  interruption,  a  canvas  on  the  easel,  round  the  floor 
canvases  with  huge  yellow  stars  and  fireworks  just  put  in,  waiting 
they  supposed  for  the  glazes  and  scumbles  that  would  turn  them 
into  masterpieces.  As  far  as  we  know,  no  new  works  came  out  of 
the  studio. 

Among  the  early  canvases  signed  by  Greaves  was  one  of  striking 
merit  and  absolutely  different  from  the  rest.  This  was  Boat  Race 
Day,  Hammersmith  Bridge,  fine  as  a  Breughel,  said  to  have  been 
done  by  him  at  the  age  of  sixteen.  But  never  before,  nor  after, 
did  he  do,  or  at  any  rate  show,  anything  like  it,  though  another 
version  of  the  race,  devoid  of  merit,  signed  Greaves,  was  on  the 
walls  of  the  Streatham  Town  Hall.  A  study  of  a  pond  in  Battersea 
Park  was  equally  remarkable  and  equally  different.  Hung  in  a 
large  group  in  New  York,  singly  in  London,  were  a  number  of 
water-colours  signed  by  both  Walter  and  Harry  Greaves,  while 
many  prints — etchings  and  dry-points — not  at  all  unlike  unfinished 
and  unsuccessful  Whistlers — were  in  the  Goupil  Gallery  exhibition. 
The  water-colours  were  crude  and  amateurish.  Before  the  Greaves 
excitement  was  completely  over,  one  came  up  for  sale  at  Robinson 
and  Fisher's  and  Robert  Ross  thought  it  should  be  bought  be 
cause  of  its  date,  for  as  this  was  1860,  it  must  therefore  prove, 
he  said,  what  Greaves  was  doing  before  he  met  Whistler.  He 
would  have  bought  it  himself  for  ten  pounds  but  a  reserve  of 
twenty-five,  which  no  bidder  seemed  disposed  to  go  beyond,  had 
been  placed  on  it.  As  more  of  Greaves'  work  in  various  mediums 
was  seen,  the  more  readily  the  intelligent  critic  agreed  with  G.  R. 
Halkett  of  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette  that  when  Greaves  tried  "a 
flight  unaided  by  Whistler's  genius"  he  went  into  another  cat 
egory  altogether. 

1900]  143 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

The  Greaves  episode,  from  beginning  to  end,  is  extraordinary. 
The  critics  based  their  claim  for  him  as  the  master  of  Whistler  on 
the  Passing  Under  Battersea  Bridge  signed  by  him  and  said  by 
him  to  have  been  exhibited  at  South  Kensington  in  1862.  When 
the  mistake  in  the  date  was  pointed  out,  the  whole  fabric  of  adula 
tion  of  Greaves  and  depreciation  of  Whistler  tottered  and  fell. 
Letters  from  Whistler  to  Greaves  show  plainly  the  relations 
between  master  and  pupil.  Whistler  was  willing  to  give  the  priv 
ilege  of  his  studio  to  his  pupils  that  they  might  learn  in  it  everything 
they  could;  not,  however,  to  imitate  and  borrow.  Greaves,  begin 
ning  a  portrait  of  his  sister,  Mrs.  Ranger,  appropriated  Whistler's 
arrangement  of  blue  on  blue.  Whistler  warned  him  of  the  danger 
of  wandering,  if  unconsciously,  into  his  symphonies.  "Don't  you 
see  Walter,  you  know  how  I  continually  invent — and  invention 
you  know  is  the  cream  of  the  whole  affair  and  so  easy  to  destroy 
the  freshness  of  it.  And  you  know  that  all  the  whole  system  of 
arrangement  and  harmonies  which  I  most  certainly  invented,  I 
brought  you  up  in,  so  that  it  is  only  natural  that  I  should  expect 
my  pupil  to  perceive  all  harmony  in  the  same  way — he  must  do 
it— for  I  have  shown  him  that  everything  outside  of  that  is  wrong. 
.  .  .  Suppose  you  were  to  see  any  other  fellows  doing  my  moon 
lights — how  vexed  you  would  be.  Well,  nothing  more  natural 
than  that  you  two  should  do  them  and  quite  right  that  the  tradi 
tions  of  the  studio  should  go  on  through  the  pupils — but  still  for 
instance  it  would  be  absurd  now  to  paint  another  White  Girl. 
Don't  you  know  what  I  mean?" 

Whistler's  attitude  revealed  by  this  letter  throws  a  strong  light  on 
the  Greaves  affair.  No  master  wants  the  flattery  of  abject  and 
misleading  imitation,  no  student  with  anything  in  him  wants  to 
pay  that  compliment  when  he  begins  to  feel  his  own  wings.  The 
critic  was  right  who,  when  the  letter  was  published  in  a  London 
paper,  quoted  it  as  proof  of  Whistler's  unselfishness  in  his  treatment 
of  Greaves.  That  Whistler  would  have  prevented  Greaves,  or 
any  other  pupil,  from  exhibiting  good  work  is  sheer  nonsense.  And 
we  know  that  he  did  not,  that  indeed,  he  went  out  of  his  way  to 
help  Greaves  to  exhibit.  In  1873  he  asked  Mr.  Alan  S.  Cole, 
from  whom  we  have  the  facts,  to  show  a  painting  by  Greaves  in 
the  South  Kensington  Exhibition  and  Harmony  in  Blue-Gray  was 
hung.  In  1874  he  again  asked  that  a  Greaves  might  be  taken  in, 
and  a  Harmony  in  White  and  Gray  by  Harry  Greaves  was  shown. 
Not  at  that  or  any  other  time  in  his  life  did  he  have  the  power  to 
keep  Greaves  from  showing  either  in  a  public  exhibition  or  at  a 
dealer's.  It  was  Greaves'  own  choice  or  the  decision  of  Selecting 

144  [1900 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

Committees  if  he  rarely  showed  during  Whistler's  lifetime,  or  for 
some  time  after  Whistler's  death.  The  canvases  unloaded  on  Spencer 
were  never  seen,  were  never  heard  of  until  Whistler  was  safe  out  of 
the  way,  and  it  may  have  been  hoped  his  defenders  were  too.  Until 
after  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  not  a  single  work  by 
Greaves  was  ever  sent  to  the  International  Exhibition,  J.  was  on 
the  jury  the  whole  time. 

Messrs.  Dowdeswell  sold  the  pictures  first  ascribed  to  Whistler  at 
Christie's  in  1917,  when  they  were  catalogued  as  Greaves  and,  if 
we  remember,  signed  by  Greaves  though  originally  his  signature 
was  not  on  them.  Like  the  paintings  sold  in  New  York  they  fetched 
small  prices — the  average  was  from  one  to  seven  guineas — with 
the  exception  of  the  big  lady  in  brown.  The  sale  passed  almost 
unnoticed.  Every  once  in  a  while  another  Greaves  appears  and 
sometimes  is  hung  in  the  Exhibitions  of  the  International  Society 
of  Sculptors,  Painters  and  Gravers,  where  none  was  seen  while 
Whistler  was  alive.  To  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  he 
contributed  one  or  two  unimportant  sketches  and  drawings  which 
he  said  were  by  Whistler. 

This  is  the  first  time  the  inner  history  of  the  Greaves  affair  has 
been  written.  But  as  criticisms  which,  had  they  been  based  upon 
fact,  would  have  destroyed  Whistler's  reputation  were  made  by 
the  art  critics  of  Great  Britain,  especially  Clutton  Brock  and  Paul 
Konody,  and  by  Christian  Brinton  in  America,  it  is  well  that  a 
true  statement  should  be  put  on  record — and  this  is  the  truth. 


CHAPTER  X:  JO  AND  MAUD.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Thursday,  July  iQth,  IQOO.  When  we  were  both  out  in  the  after 
noon  Keppel  called  with  Roullier,  the  Chicago  print  dealer.  Keppel 
left  a  note  to  say  he  had  a  piece  of  news  for  us;  the  Caxton  Club, 
with  Mr.  Roullier's  assistance,  were  getting  out  a  catalogue  of 
Whistler's  etchings,  which  would  contain  photogravures  after 
everyone  of  his  plates.  It  was  to  be  published  in  a  limited  edition 
of  two  hundred  and  to  be  sold  at  twenty  dollars  a  copy.  This  was 
a  bombshell  in  our  midst,  for  in  the  Life  we  have  arranged  with 
Heinemann  to  write,  Whistler  said  he  was  not  willing  to  have  any 
of  his  etchings  reproduced  by  photogravure.  About  ten,  Whistler 
himself  appeared,  an  extraordinary  figure  in  white  trousers,  low 
1900]  145 

10 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

white  waistcoat,  dinner-jacket  and  the  same  grey  felt  hat  set 
jauntily  on  one  side.  He  was  rather  cross.  " I  have  dined  badly — 
came  home  late  from  the  studio,  was  banished  to  a  dining-room 
I  do  not  like  at  the  hotel,  and  went  to  the  Tivoli  with  some  vague 
idea  of  German  beer.  But  I  had  a  bit  of  veal  swimming  in  gravy 
intended  for  a  schnitzel  and  a  potato  salad  that  was  lukewarm,  and 
a  piece  of  cheese  that  was  strong — a  shocking  dinner — and,  you 
know,  if  you  happen  to  have  a  piece  of  American  cake,  I  could 
eat  that,"  and,  of  course  I  hadn't  any.  Began  by  reading  us  the 
article  in  The  Star  about  China,  in  a  state  of  delight  over  De  Wet's 
breaking  through  Buller's  ranks.  .  .  . 

Then  J.  told  him  about  the  Catalogue.  He  was  annoyed.  He 
knew  there  was  to  be  a  catalogue,  that  was  all  right,  they  had  come 
to  him  about  it  and  were  charming  and  polite.  But  the  illustrations 
were  evidently  unexpected,  though  he  gave  me  the  impression  of 
having  committed  himself  unintentionally  in  some  way,  and  so 
not  having  any  redress.  He  began  to  write  down  on  a  bit  of  paper 
letters  to  Freer,  to  the  Committee,  to  Eddy,  and  he  must  Write 
them  at  once,  though  Joseph  reminded  him  that  the  post  did  not 
go  until  Saturday  and  he  had  better  see  Roullier  before  writing 
anything.  Keppel  might  possibly  be  mistaken  in  detail.  There 
upon  he  began  to  make  Keppel  his  scapegoat.  What  had  he  to  do 
that  he  should  be  worrying  about  it?  J.  said  that  Keppel  was 
surprised  at  the  whole  business,  thought  it  scandalous  if  they  had 
not  Whistler's  permission.  He  belonged  to  the  Caxton  Club  him 
self  once,  but  resigned,  they  were  nothing  but  rich  pork-packers. 
"And  what  right  has  Keppel  to  sneer  at  pork-packers?"  Whistler 
wanted  to  know,  "what  is  he  but  a  dry-goods  man?"  Then  Wed- 
more  came  in  for  his  share.  J.  wondered  if  they  had  used  W'ed- 
more's  Catalogue?  "So  much  the  better  if  they  have,  then  I  can 
write  letters  about  Wedmore  that  I  would  like  to  have  published." 
He  was  almost  snappish  with  J.  "Why  repeat  it?"  he  said,  "when 
I  know  it  all  already."  Altogether,  clearly  he  was  annoyed  and 
when  it 'was  arranged  that  Roullier  should  come  to  his  studio  at 
four,  he  had  an  engagement  with  Mr.  Russell  at  five,  and  J.  sug 
gested  that  he  and  Heinemann  should  come  a  little  before  Roullier, 
146  [1900 


(See  page  161) 


JO 

DRY-POINT.  M.    77. 

Print  from  the  destroyed  plate 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

he  was  furious  "A  regular  invasion  of  my  studio."  But  he  saw 
the  necessity  and  agreed. 

Another  step  in  The  Architectural  Review  affair.  His  letter  to 
Wilson  brought  an  apology  from  Abram  to  Grimaldi,  and  a  request 
that  Grimaldi  would  call  again  on  Tuesday.  "And  then,  you 
know,  the  Lord  interfered.  Grimaldi  had  a  sunstroke  and  went  to 
bed — and  I  dictated  a  very  Whistleresque  letter  from  Grimaldi  to 
Abram,  his  regrets  and  he  was  ill,  and  the  cheque  was  the  thing. 
There  was  nothing  to  talk  over."  And  so,  about  twelve,  he  went 
off,  J.  walking  to  the  hotel  with  him. 

THIS  note  retains  something  of  the  excitement  into  which  we  were 
all  thrown  by  the  first  news  to  reach  us  of  the  Catalogue  planned 
by  the  Caxton  Club.  Mr.  Keppel  who  brought  the  news  was 
Frederick  Keppel  whom  Whistler  had  unfortunately  and  mis 
takenly  ranked  with  "the  enemies,"  and  Roullier  was  Albert 
Roullier  of  the  Chicago  firm  of  his  name.  The  agitation  was  great 
while  it  lasted,  for  any  disturbance  of  this  kind  was  irritating  to 
Whistler  when  it  interfered  with  his  work,  while  to  Heinemann  and 
ourselves  the  results  might  have  been  serious  because  of  the  use 
of  the  illustrations  which  we  feared  might  take  from  the  importance 
of  ours.  However,  nothing  worse  came  of  it  than  much  worry  and 
time  lost  for  a  few  days.  The  Catalogue,  eventually,  was  published 
without  illustrations.  It  was  compiled  by  Mr.  Howard  Mansfield 
and  is  the  only  complete  catalogue  of  Whistler's  etchings,  for  Mr. 
Kennedy  gave  up  the  descriptions  and  trusted  to  illustrations,  and 
for  practical  work  one  is  compelled  to  use  both.  The  Illustrated 
Grolier  Catalogue,  compiled  by  Mr.  E.  G.  Kennedy  and  published 
much  later,  contains  a  complete  set  of  reproductions  of  Whistler's 
etchings.  But  they  are  not  done  by  photogravure  and  there  is  no 
danger  of  their  being  confused  with  the  originals.  What  Whistler 
was  afraid  of  was  that  reproductions  in  photogravure  might  be 
made,  as  some  had  already  been  made,  of  the  same  size  as  the 
originals,  and  that  collectors  might  be  deceived  by  them,  as  indeed 
they  had  been  during  his  lifetime.  Since  his  death  many  of  his 
etchings  have  been  reproduced  by  photogravure,  including  a  num 
ber  published  by  J.  in  his  Etchers  and  Etching,  but  as  these  were 
all  signed  by  Ringler,  the  photo-engraver,  and  as  they  are  a  differ 
ent  size  from  the  originals,  there  is  no  excuse  for  any  collector 
being  deceived  by  them,  though  they  are  remarkably  good  repro 
ductions.  Whistler  was  always  worried  about  the  publication  of 
1900]  147 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

his  prints  and  the  minute  we  heard  of  the  proposed  Caxton  Club 
venture,  we  realized  what  it  would  mean  to  him. 
It  is  because  we  know  how  Whistler  felt  in  this  matter  that  we 
regret  the  more  the  action  of  his  executrix  which  led  to  much  con 
fusion  among  collectors  of  his  lithographs.  She  would  not  allow 
Way,  who  alone  understood  anything  about  the  stones  from  which 
he  had  printed  Whistler's  work,  to  print  them,  though  Whistler, 
after  he  gave  up  Way  and  took  the  stones  from  him,  had  been 
willing  for  him  to  print  the  portrait  of  J.  for  our  Lithography  and 
Lithographers,  sure  that  no  one  else  could  print  it  so  well.  Instead, 
Miss  Philip  turned  over  such  stones  as  she  chose  to  Goulding  who 
knew  nothing  about  them  and  did  not  know  how  Whistler  wanted 

E roofs  pulled,  and  who  used  for  the  reprints  not  Whistler's 
old  paper,  but  modern  O.  W.  paper.  The  water  mark  can 
:n  on  the  prints,  a  guide  to  the  collector  of  intelligence.  They 
were  not  signed  as  they  were  printed  after  Whistler's  death.  Many 
of  his  lithographs  were  printed  during  his  lifetime  without  his 
knowledge  and  later  issued  unsigned,  and  these  were,  as  a  rule, 
printed  on  old  paper  by  Way.  They  are  genuine,  but  not  signed 
by  Whistler.  Miss  Philip,  we  believe,  asked  for  the  reprints,  sold 
by  Dunthorne  and  as  we  have  said  unsigned,  the  same  price  that 
Whistler  asked  for  proofs  printed  by  Way  and  signed  by  himself. 
There  was  nothing  that  was  not  correct  in  this  proceeding,  but 
Whistler  never  would  have  permitted  it.  The  whole  affair  was  a 
failure,  or  rather  it  failed  because  Goulding  used  his  own  modern 
paper,  by  which  the  reprints  can  be  easily  detected.  It  has  also 
been  stated  that  Goulding  was  furnished  with  transfers  instead 
of  the  original  stones.  The  Ways  certainly  printed  many  proofs, 
giving  one  set  to  the  British  Museum  and  at  last  selling  more  or 
less  complete  sets  at  auction,  while  for  long  it  was  possible  to  get 
proofs  at  their  office.  On  one  occasion  stones  were  brought  to  the 
Art  Workers'  Guild,  printed  from,  and  the  proofs  given  away.  But 
the  Ways  only  imitated  the  editors  of  The  Whirlwind.  So  long  as 
Way's  Shop  was  in  Gough  Square  there  were  prints  by  Whistler 
in  the  windows. 

In  January,  1921,  Messrs.  Frederick  Keppel  and  Co.  showed  in 
their  gallery  in  New  York  a  collection  of  lithographs  and,  concern 
ing  them,  Mr.  David  Keppel  told  a  curious  story  which  he  said  he 
had  from  Mr.  G.  Meyer  of  Messrs.  Colnaghi  and  Obach,  London: 
— that  to  Miss  Birnie  Philip,  along  with  the  lithographic  stones, 
Whistler  left  "a  small  supply  of  the  finest  old  paper  which  he  had 
collected,  with  definite  instructions  that  she  take  a  tirage  and  then 
render  it  impossible  for  further  proofs  to  be  taken  ...  by  covering 

H8  [1900 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

them  with  a  sort  of  varnish  which  makes  it  impossible  to  print 
from  them  but  leaves  the  stone  itself  with  Whistler's  drawing 
still  visible."  This  statement  of  Mr.  Keppel's  is  interesting  and  a 
surprise  to  us  because,  before  these  prints  were  exhibited  in  his 
gallery,  we  had  only  known  of  the  prints  pulled  by  Charles 
Goulding  on  O.  W.  paper.  Mr.  Keppel  further  says  that  Whistler 
left  a  certain  number  of  proofs  printed  by  Way,  and  that  these 
impressions  were  signed  in  pencil  with  the  Butterfly.  In  order 
that  there  might  be  no  confusion,  Miss  Philip  stamped  every  print 
on  the  back  with  her  initials;  those  of  Way's  printing  with  a  stamp 
having  a  square  border  and  those  of  Goulding's  with  a  round  one. 
He  further  says  that  as  the  stock  of  old  paper  was  soon  exhausted, 
some  of  the  stones  were  printed  on  O.  W.  paper,  bringing  the  num 
ber  printed  by  Goulding  to  about  thirty-five  prints — not  proofs  as 
Mr.  Keppel  calls  them — each.  The  whole  story  is  confusing, 
though  the  prints  are  not,  for  Mr.  Keppel  further  says  that  the 
number  printed  by  Way  and  Goulding  together  was  about  sixty. 
As  Way  has  most  distinctly  stated  in  his  Catalogue  that  only  six 
or  seven  of  some  of  these  stones  were  printed,  it  is  not  easy  to 
make  the  numbers  agree.  Another  thing,  the  lithographs  were  not 
printed  by  F.  Goulding  but  by  his  brother  Charles  Goulding,  and 
the  use  of  the  name  Goulding  is  rather  misleading  as  F.  Goulding 
never  printed  lithographs,  but  turned  them  over  to  his  brother 
who  did.  And  the  statement  that  they  were  printed  under  Miss 
Philip's  directions  hardly  makes  the  matter  clearer.  Goulding 
told  J.  that  she  did  come  to  his  place  while  the  printing  was  being 
done.  The  whole  business,  even  down  to  the  stones,  as  we  have 
stated,  is  another  Whistler  mystery.  The  only  genuine  Whistler 
proofs  upon  which  collectors  can  rely  are  those  signed  by  the  artist 
and  printed  during  his  lifetime. 

Friday,  July  2Oth.  J.  spent  the  day  mostly  between  Heinemann's 
office,  Keppel's  rooms  and  Whistler's  studio — with  the  result  that 
a  letter  was  written  by  Whistler  to  the  Caxton  Club  to  stop  the 
publication  of  the  photogravures  after  his  etchings  in  the  pro 
posed  Catalogue. 

Dined  at  Sauter's;  no  one  else  there  but  Whistler.  An  oppressively 
hot  evening.  We  found  the  road  up  just  before  Notting  Hill,  and 
had  to  make  a  great  detour,  and  were  a  quarter  of  an  hour  late. 
But  Whistler  was  half  an  hour  later;  he  had  been  to  Kew,  he  said, 
hunting  for  the  house.  The  talk  at  dinner  was  largely  of  the  Boers: 
1900]  149 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

the  Sauters  sympathizing,  he  could  say  what  he  wanted.  After 
dinner,  the  men  stayed  in  the  dining  room  and  talked  about  the 
International.  When  they  joined  us  in  the  garden,  he  slept  a 
little.  But  I  was  struck,  when,  afterwards  we  went  up  to  the 
studio;  with  the  interest  he  showed  in  Sauter's  work,  and  the  way 
he  managed  with  a  word  to  point  out  the  defects  or  merits  in  it. 
There  was  a  big  more  than  life-size  portrait  of  Prince  Troubetzkoi 
on  the  easel — a  sort  of  Sandow  creature  whose  very  size,  as  you 
looked,  seemed  to  knock  you  down.  Presently  Sauter  brought  out 
a  portrait  he  had  done  of  himself,  a  half  length,  on  a  much  smaller 
scale — a  little  less  than  life  size.  "There,"  said  Whistler,  "that 
is  the  way  you  saw  yourself,  isn't  it,  when  you  looked  in  the  glass 
a  few  feet  away?  Then  you  must  have  seen  Troubetzkoi  like  that 
too,  and  not  like  the  giant  you  have  painted."  We  all  drove  home 
together — but  he  slept  most  of  the  way. 

Sauter  is  George  Sauter,  a  Bavarian  artist,  who  came  to  London 
to  live  and  then  married  Miss  Lilian  Galsworthy,  sister  of  Mr. 
John  Galsworthy.  They  had  a  delightful  house  and  studio  in 
Holland  Park  Avenue,  where  Whistler  was  always  glad,  as  we 
were,  to  go.  The  house  now  stands  for  tragedy — the  life  in  it 
wrecked  by  the  war  as  was  the  life  in  so  many  other  houses  not 
only  in  London,  but  the  world  over.  Sauter  was  first  interned, 
then  sent  back  to  Germany.  It  is  his  own  country,  true,  but  the 
best  years  of  his  life  were  spent  in  England  which,  therefore,  is 
for  him  the  land  of  many  associations  and  friends.  With  the 
feeling  as  it  is  now,  the  chances  are  he  can  never  return,  though  it 
might  be  recorded  that  the  English,  more  generous  than  we  showed 
ourselves,  realized  that  an  artist  has  nothing  to  do  with  military 
affairs  and  got  up  a  petition  for  his  release  from  the  internment 
camp.  But  since  then  the  British  Government  has  made  his  life 
a  burden.  The  petition  was  signed,  among  others,  by  Lavery, 
Guthrie,  the  directors  of  several  galleries,  and  other  prominent 
people.  But  nothing  came  of  it,  except  Sauter's  deportation  to 
the  land  where  he  belonged  by  birth,  exchanged  with  an  English 
prisoner  of  war  interned  in  Germany. 

Two  reminiscences  connected  with  Sauter  have  an  appropriate 
place  here.  Years  before,  there  was  to  be  an  exhibition  in  Munich 
and  Sauter  was  appointed  Commissioner  in  England.  Whistler 
was  asked  to  meet  Herr  Paulus,  the  manager  of  the  exhibition, 
150  [1900 


WALL  OF  THE  FIRST  INTERNATIONAL  EXHIBITION  AT  KNIGHTSBRIDGE 
The  Centre  Group  of  Works  arranged  by  Whistler.     Photograph 


WALL  OF  THE  WHISTLER  EXHIBITION  AT  BRADFORD 
Arranged  by  Joseph  Pennell 

OILS,    WATER-COLOURS   AXD    PRIKTS    HUNG    TOGETHER 

Whistler's  Scheme.      Photograph 

v  J     hno?   ?nc^ 


SKETCHES  BY  WHISTLER 

PEN-AND-INK 

For  the  Seal  of  the  International  Society  of  Sculptors,  Painters  and 
Gravers  and  the  Final  Design  Used  by  the  Society 

(See  Appendix  I,  page  306) 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

and  a  distinguished  company,  at  Sauter's  father-in-law,  Mr. 
Galsworthy's.  He  came  about  an  hour  late,  but  they  had  waited 
for  him,  and  the  old  gentleman,  in  a  severe  tone,  greeted  him  with 
the  remark :^  "We  are  all  so  hungry,  Mr.  Whistler."  "What  a 
good  sign,"  said  Whistler,  and  they  went  immediately  to  dinner. 
It  was  at  Sauter's  house  another  evening  that  Mrs.  Sauter  told 
Whistler  of  Felix  Moscheles'  experience  in  Trafalgar  Square 
shortly  before  at  a  Peace  Demonstration.  A  knife  was  thrown 
that  just  missed  him.  "Ha!  ha!"  laughed  Whistler,  "and  so 
Moscheles  just  missed  the  knife.  So  like  Moscheles.  Always  just 
missing  something.  Ha!  ha!  And  he  just  missed  the  knife." 
Sauter  was  for  some  time  Honorary  Secretary  of  the  International 
Society,  and  a  more  faithful  supporter  and  admirer  Whistler  never 
had.  Whether  Whistler  was  in  London  or  Paris,  if  not  at  the  meet 
ings,  which  he  always  attended  when  he  could,  he  had  to  receive 
a  written  copy  of  the  Minutes  with  full  explanations,  brought  or 
sent  to  him  by  the  Honorary  Secretary.  He  was  not  President  in 
name  merely,  but  he  insisted  on  knowing  everything  that  was 
done  by  the  Society. 

During  the  whole  of  his  Presidency,  which  lasted  to  the  day  of 
his  death,  the  members  of  the  International  Society  of  Sculptors, 
Painters  and  Gravers,  the  title  of  which  even  was  Whistler's,  were 
absolutely  though  not  abjectly  devoted  to  their  President.  It  was 
he  who  made  the  Society,  his  influence  and  energy  which  made  it 
a  success.  There  were  at  first  scarcely  any  English  members  in  it. 
They  were  mostly  Americans,  Frenchmen,  Germans,  Scotchmen, 
Irishmen,  Scandinavians — only  one  or  two  English.  If  a  meeting 
of  the  Council  was  to  be  important,  Sir  James  Guthrie  would 
come  up  from  Edinburgh,  and  Thaulow  and  Blanche  from  Dieppe, 
where  they  had  been  consorting  and  intriguing  with  the  allies  and 
the  enemies — in  art,  not  war. 

One  day,  J.  remembers,  J.  J.  Shannon,  a  member  of  the  Council, 
was  elected  to  the  Royal  Academy.  Whistler's  abiding  faith  was 
that  an  artist  should  belong  actively  only  to  one  society  and  always 
show  in  it,  and,  so  far  as  he  was  concerned,  that  society  was  to  be 
the  International.  The  news  of  Shannon's  election  reached  Paris 
and  Whistler  at  once  wrote,  or  wired,  that  Shannon  must  either 
decline  his  election  to  the  Academy  or  resign  from  the  Council  of 
the  International.  If  he  did  not,  Whistler  would  resign  himself. 
"It  was  no  moment  of  half  measures,  peace  was  not  their  preoccu 
pation.  The  Society  was  a  fighting  ship  and  carried  the  very  best 
shots  in  Europe."  A  meeting  was  at  once  called.  Shannon 
attended.  He  refused  to  resign  from  either.  After  a  lengthy  dis- 

1900]  151 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

cussion  it  was  arranged  that  he  should  be  made  an  Honorary  Mem 
ber  of  the  International  Society,  as  already  one  or  two  Royal 
Academicians  held  that  rank.  The  Council  were  aware  that  no 
such  information  could  be  written  to  the  President,  and  they 
deputed  Lavery  and  J.  to  go  to  Paris  and  straighten  things  out, 
if  they  could. 

They  caught  the  nine  o'clock  train  from  Charing  Cross.  There 
were  no  cabins  on  the  boat,  no  sleeping  cars  on  the  train,  and,  sad 
wrecks,  they  landed  in  Paris  at  dawn.  They  idled  down  the 
Boulevards,  drinking  as  many  cups  of  coffee  as  they  could  and 
eating  as  many  brioches.  They  had  wired  they  were  coming,  but 
they  knew  they  could  not  see  Whistler  before  ten  or  eleven,  if  even 
then,  for  he  had  answered  they  were  to  breakfast  at  noon  in  the 
studio.  That  was  six  hours  away.  Lavery  had  an  idea.  They 
would  take  a  bath.  They  went  into  the  well-known  ark  with  the 
palm  tree  smoke  stack  that,  from  time  immemorial,  has  stood  in 
the  Seine.  They  were  given  adjoining  tubs,  with  a  partition 
between  and  a  little  window  in  it.  Lavery  at  once  opened  the 
window  to  ask  J.  if  he  had  any  soap,  and  of  course  he  hadn't,  soap 
never  then  being  supplied  in  France.  And  so  they  ordered  a  piece, 
and  after  they  had  soaked  and  boiled  themselves  and  passed  it  to 
each  other,  and  read  the  papers,  they  went  out  to  pay  their  bill, 
Lavery  carefully  carrying  the  soap.  In  the  bill,  it  was  five  francs. 
The  proprietor  thought  he  had  a  couple  of  Englishmen.  He  soon 
found  out  that  Sir  John  Lavery  was  very  well  acquainted  with  the 
artistic  French  of  the  Quarter.  And,  as  a  final  piece  of  advice  to 
the  proprietor,  he  violently  threw  the  cake  of  soap  through  the 
window  into  the  river,  only  to  remember  that  he  had  already 
paid  for  it. 

The  rest  of  the  morning  was  spent  in  visiting  the  Luxembourg  and 
calling  on  Mrs.  Whistler  in  hopes  that  Whistler  might  be  there. 
Finally,  they  got  to  the  studio,  there  to  be  received  by  Carmen, 
who  had  been  posing  in  her  birthday  robe,  and  she  then  got  break 
fast.  And  after  this  was  finished  and  Mrs.  Whistler  came  up,  he 
showed  them  new  things  and  his  phonograph  which  was  a  new  toy. 
And  he  talked  of  everything,  except  the  Society,  until  it  was  almost 
time  for  them  to  go.  And  then  he  told  them  just  what  had  got  to 
be  done,  and  they  hurried  back  in  the  three  o'clock  train  to  do  it. 
And  at  the  meeting  called  for  the  next  day,  it  was  done,  and 
Shannon  was  made  an  Honorary  Member  and  severed  all  executive 
relations  with  the  Society.  And  it  might  be  mentioned  also  that 
the  Council's  devotion  for  the  President  and  the  President's 
devotion  for  the  Society  went  to  the  extent  of  everybody  paying 
152  [1900 


INTERIOR  OP  ROOM  IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  ROW  SHOWING 
THE  MANTELPIECE  BEFORE  WHICH  THE  LITTLE  WHITE  GIRL  WAS  PAINTED 


CONTEMPORARY    PHOTOGRAPH 

Loaned  by  Mr.   Chambers. 


(See  pages  n7,  161  and  300) 


DINING-ROOM   IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  ROW 

CONTEMPORARY  PHOTOGRAPH 

Loaned  by  Mr.  Chambers 


(See  page  117} 


FIREPLACE,  DINING-ROOM  IN  WHISTLER'S  FIRST  HOUSE  IN  LINDSEY  ROW 

CONTEMPORARY   PHOTOGRAPH 

Loaned  by  Mr.  Chambers 
(See  page  117) 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

their  own  travelling  expenses.  There  was  a  large  amount  of  corre 
spondence  with  Whistler  when  J.  became  Honorary  Secretary  for 
a  time,  but  most  of  this  has  disappeared.  It  may,  and  it  is  to  be 
hoped  that  it  will  turn  up  again  some  day,  for,  when  the  letters 
were  read  to  the  Council,  they  showed  Whistler's  intense  interest 
in  the  Society,  his  practical  suggestions  for  its  success,  a  perfect 
contradiction  to  all  those  who  say  that  he  had  no  business  ability. 
At  any  rate,  it  is  probable  that  there  are  copies  of  these  letters  in 
the  possession  of  the  executrix,  and  they  ought  to  be  published. 
His  private  letters  were  as  full  of  the  subject.  When  ill  and  unable 
to  preside  at  meetings,  he  insisted  upon  J.  coming  or  writing  to 
tell  him  all  that  had  happened — "to  the  Captain  in  his  berth 
everything  must  be  reported."  The  Journal  is  a  proof  of  this — 
so  are  his  letters  to  us.  He  wrote  from  Paris  to  urge  J.  to  go  to 
all  the  Council  Meetings,  to  see  to  the  hanging  of  the  exhibitions, 
not  to  forget  to  look  out  for  Forain,  or  Milcendeau,  or  Thaulow, 
for  one  reason  or  another  in  anxiety  about  his  work.  Plans  of  the 
galleries  were  forwarded  to  him  in  Paris  and  returned  with  sugges 
tions  even  to  the  placing  of  chairs  and  tables.  No  detail  was  too 
small,  no  scheme  too  large  that  could  add  to  "the  finish  and 
intimacy  and  mystery  and  general  richness  and  concentration  of 
the  exhibitions." 

Thursday,  July  26.  Whistler  came  in  for  a  few  minutes  early  in 
the  morning,  about  half  past  nine,  a  hansom  waiting  for  him  at 
the  door,  to  say  he  would  dine  to-morrow  evening  to  meet  Mrs. 
Whitman.  He  wore  his  white  waistcoat  and  trousers  and  his  ham 
mock  hat,  and,  for  the  first  time  in  my  experience,  seemed  exhausted 
by  the  heat.  He  was  too  tired  to  say  anything,  except  that  he 
thought  he  would  have  to  get  out  of  it.  Mrs.  and  Miss  Philip  are 
going  over  to  Ireland  on  Monday  or  Tuesday,  and  will  look  for  a 
house  and  then  he  probably  will  join  them. 

Friday,  July  27th.  Whistler  and  Mrs.  Whitman  came  to  dinner, 
and  I  left  the  conversation  to  them:  Mrs.  Whitman,  the  intelli 
gent,  emotional,  "brainy"  Boston  woman,  with  a  quotation,  an 
anecdote,  the  right  word  for  every  occasion.  Whistler  appreci 
ative  of  it  all.  Why  did  he  not  come  home?  Such  a  welcome  was 
waiting.  He  had  no  idea  of  the  respect  and  honour  in  which  he 
was  held.  "They  have  a  funny  way  of  showing  it,"  he  said.  "If 
1900]  153 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

ever  anything  particularly  offensive  reaches  me,  well,  you  know, 
it  comes  from  America.  If  anything  goes  the  rounds  of  the  papers 
here,  it  is  taken  up,  intensified  a  hundred  fold  in  the  American 
papers.  When  I  go  to  America,  I  shall  go  straight  to  Baltimore, 
then  to  West  Point,  then  sail  for  here."  No,  she  said,  they  would 
come  down  upon  him  from  Boston,  seize  him  by  main  force  and 
carry  him  off. 

She  had  been  to  the  Academy  and  seen  the  big  Sargent.  "  It  looked 
like  a  heap  of  women  being  poured  out  of  a  picture."  Whistler 
repeated  very  much  what  he  has  already  said  of  Sargent.  "Well, 
you  know,  people  tell  me  it  is  so  clever.  Has  any  one  ever  stopped 
in  front  of  a  Titian  or  a  Tintoretto  and  called  it  clever?  What? 
That  sort  of  cleverness  is  infernal.  I  wouldn't,  for  a  moment, 
have  anyone  think  I  was  saying  anything  about  Sargent,  who  is  a 
good  fellow,  but  as  for  his  work  it  is  neither  better  nor  worse  than 
that  of  the  usual  Academician." 

Then  the  Boers  followed.  Buller  making  them  respect  his  rear. 
I  said  that  should  remain  in  history  in  his  words.  After  Mrs. 
Whitman  had  gone,  he  asked  me  what  had  he  said  that  should 
"remain"?  An  evening,  however,  not  easy  to  record. 

Mrs.  Sarah  Whitman,  as  a  painter  and  designer  is  known  even 
outside  Boston.  She  wrote  to  E.  when  she  heard  of  Whistler's 
death,  knowing  what  it  meant  to  us  both,  and  in  her  letter  she 
spoke  of  her  meetings  with  him  in  our  flat,  where  he  seemed  hap 
pier  than  anywhere  else  after  the  loss  of  his  wife: — "I  cherish  a 
long  gratitude  for  those  moments  you  gave  me  with  him — the 
only  really  happy  ones  I  ever  saw  him  have  after  Mrs.  Whistler 
died.  The  rest  was  sad  and  full  of  remembrance,  and  I  like  to 
think  he  is  at  peace."  The  Sargent  Mrs.  Whitman  referred  to  is 
one  of  six  in  the  Royal  Academy  of  1900 — the  portrait  group  of  the 
three  sisters,  Lady  Elcho,  Mrs.  Adeane  and  Mrs.  Tennant. 
Whistler  was  bitter  about  the  way  he  was  treated  in  America,  the 
more  so  because  he  never  forgot  that  he  was  an  American,  ready 
as  his  countrymen  were  to  forget  it.  He  railed  at  the  "cursed 
Yankees"  to  Mr.  Lucas  when  he  was  badly  hung  in  the  Paris 
Exposition  of  1867,  though  it  was  in  the  American  Section  he  pre 
ferred  to  show  when  he  was  decently  treated.  Again,  he  was  furious 
with  "these  infernal  American  people"  who  are  so  horrid  about 
154  [190x3 


INTERIOR  OF  THE  LINDSEY  ROW  STUDIO 
Whistler  Painting  the  Portrait  of  His  Mother 

OIL 
By  Walter  Greaves 

According  to  Walter  Greaves  the  date  1869  is  on  this  painting  in  Greaves'  writing.  The 
painting  Batter  sea  Bridge  is  shown  in  it  behind  the  portrait  of  the  Mother,  though  it  was 
not  exhibited  until  1877 — and  the  Mother  was  not  shown  until  1872.  Besides  which,  at 
no  time  to  our  knowledge,  did  Whistler  have  a  number  of  his  paintings  and  prints  on  the  wall. 
Not  was  the  table  palette  on  an  angle  like  a  desk.  And  we  never  saw  any  such  shaped  room 

in  Chelsea 


In  the  possession  of  the  Rosenbach  Co. 


(See  page  116) 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

the  taxes  for,  as  every  American  artist  who  has  lived  in  London 
knows,  the  getting  of  a  consular  certificate  when  work  is  to  be 
sent  home  is  a  nuisance  as  horrid  as  Whistler  called  it.  And  he 
resented  his  treatment  by  American  papers — thought  it,  really, 
a  curious  thing  to  notice  how  offensive  they  always  were  to  him 
when  they  got  the  chance.  But  it  hurt  him  most  that  Americans 
misunderstood  him  as  persistently  as  "the  Islanders."  We  are 
still  often  astounded  at  the  entire  misconception  of  him  and  his 
art  and  his  standard  of  conduct  among  some  people  in  our  own 
and  his  country.  It  grows  stronger  every  day  and  little  men 
are  belauded  by  little  critics  that  they  may  be  shoved  into  his 
shoes.  Of  the  sort  of  thing  thought  and  said  we  had  an  instance 
two  or  three  years  after  Whistler's  death  and  made  a  note  of  it 
at  the  time. 

February  ijth,  1907.  Dined  with  Mrs.  Potter  Palmer.  She  hadn't 
much  to  tell  us  about  Whistler  we  had  not  heard  except  that  Mrs. 
Farquhar  (Miss  Peck)  never  got  back  her  portrait.  Whistler 
returned  the  money.  And  the  Pecks  had  talked  about  it  and 
exaggerated  it  to  themselves  until  now  they  are  honestly  under  the 
impression  that  it  was  the  most  wonderful  portrait  he  ever  painted 
and  that  he  wanted  to  keep  it  himself  to  show  and  exhibit  as  a 
contradiction  to  the  reports  of  his  falling-off,  and  then  sell  it  for 
an  enormous  price. 

This  was  repeated  to  J.  when  he  was  giving  the  Scammon  lectures 
in  April,  1920,  at  Chicago,  only  the  story  had  been  carried  so  much 
further  that  he  was  assured  Whistler  stole  the  money.  And  J. 
had  to  explain  that,  as  he  knew  for  a  fact,  Whistler  returned  the 
money  and  never  finished  the  picture.  From  the  beginning,  how 
ever,  there  were  the  exceptions  who  understood.  American  artists 
were  in  sympathy,  if  the  American  public  was  not,  and  we  are  glad 
to  remember  that  La  Farge  was  one  of  the  exceptions.  When  we 
were  in  New  York  in  the  autumn  of  1908,  we  went  on  the  morning  of 

November  I2th,  1908,  with  Mrs.  Cadwalader  Jones,  to  call  on 
LaFarge  in  the  old  studio  built  by  Hunt  in  Tenth  Street.  He  told 
us  that  he  never  met  Whistler  until  he  went  to  Paris  in  1895,  the 
year  his  South  Sea  sketches  were  in  the  Champ-de-Mars  Salon. 
Whistler  was  charming  and  two  things  he  then  said  were  recalled 
1900]  155 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

by  La  Farge.  One  was,  "Well,  you  know,  when  I  first  came  to 
England  I  found  I  had  to  put  my  foot  in  it,  and — well — I  have  kept 
it  there  ever  since ! "  Another  example  of  this  sort  was  related  to  J. 
by  Mrs.  Paul  Bartlett.  One  day,  she  said,  he  was  pitching  into  some 
unfortunate.  "Why  do  you  go  for  him?  He  has  one  foot  in  the 
grave,"  said  Mrs.  Bartlett.  "Oh!  that's  not  the  foot  I  want  to 
get  hold  of,"  said  Whistler.  La  Farge's  other  story  was  of  Whistler 
saying  "I  have  always  had  such  good  luck.  Somebody  always 
has  said  something  that  gave  me  the  chance  to  say  something  I 
wanted  to  say  in  reply."  La  Farge's  comment  was  that  this,  like 
many  of  Whistler's  sayings,  sounded  like  a  witticism  but  was  really 
sound,  brute  common  sense.  Whistler  sent  a  picture  called 
Seule  (The  Coast  of  Brittany:  Alone  with  the  Tide)  to  the  National 
Academy  in  New  York  and  La  Farge  and  St.  Gaudens,  who  were 
on  the  Selecting  Committee,  at  once  accepted  it.  The  Hanging 
Committee,  of  which  they  were  not  members,  skied  it,  above  a 
door.  They  were  indignant,  and  La  Farge  said  it  was  then,  in 
their  indignation,  that  they  resolved  upon  their  secession  from  the 
Academy,  and  founded  the  Society  of  American  Artists. 

This  is  La  Farge's  own  story.  He  was  an  artist,  not  an  amateur 
like  many  people  who  have  told  other  stories.  Over  officious 
American  friends  sometimes  made  Whistler  see  an  offence  where 
none  was  intended,  thus  adding  to  his  irritation.  It  was  a  grief 
to  us  when,  in  the  last  months  of  his  life,  he  was  worried  and 
angered  most  unnecessarily  by  Freer's  report  of  the  shocking 
indifference  with  which  his  pictures  were  hung  in  that  year's 
exhibition  of  the  Pennsylvania  Academy  of  the  Fine  Arts.  Mr. 
Harrison  Morris,  who  was  in  charge,  has  always  assured  us  they 
could  not  have  been  better  hung.  So  have  Mr.  Henry  McCarter 
and  Mr.  McLure  Hamilton  who  saw  them  and  who  explained  the 
screen  which  was  the  chief  offence  to  Freer.  It  was  not  the  usual 
sort  stuck  up  in  the  middle  of  the  room  but  one  placed  at  the 
end  of  the  large  gallery,  making  a  centre,  and  the  Whistlers  on  it 
formed  the  only  group  to  which  a  panel  was  given. 

Sunday,  July  2Qth,  1900.  Whistler  to  dinner  with  me  alone.  J. 
still  away.  He  brought  Reynolds'  newspaper  with  him,  which  he 
read  with  glee  after  dinner.  But  the  chief  talk  was  of  spirits.  He 
156  [1900 


I  1 

NOTE  BLANCHE 

Portrait  of  Jo 

OIL 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Cobden  Sanderson 


(See  page  161) 


' 


. 


L 


SKETCHES  OF  MAUD 

PEN-AND-INK 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

told  me  how,  in  the  old  days,  he  went  to  Rossetti's,  the  White 
Girl — "the  Irish  girl  with  red  hair" — with  him,  and  they  all  put 
their  hands  on  the  table,  and  wonderful  things  happened.  "One 
day,  I  and  the  White  Girl  went  into  her  room  and  just  the  two 
alone  tried  the  same  experiment,  and  a  cousin  from  the  South 
talked  to  me  and  told  me  the  most  wonderful  things.  Again  by 
holding  a  lacquer  box,  a  beautiful  Japanese  box,  one  of  the  many 
wonderful  things  in  the  Chelsea  house,  between  us,  we  had  the 
same  sort  of  manifestations.  But  it  is  a  study,  really,  that  would 
engross  a  man's  whole  lifetime,  and  I  have  my  painting  to  engross 
me.  I  believe?  Yes."  Every  argument  against  it  was  disposed  of. 
"The  silliness,  as  a  rule,  of  the  spirit's  performance?  They  may 
seem  silly  now,  but  wasn't  the  beginning  of  some  of  the  wonderful 
electrical  contrivances  we  have  the  mere  dancing  of  little  paper 
dolls  on  a  table?  The  darkness  that  is  always  necessary?  Why  not? 
Everyone  knows,  there  are  certain  chemicals  that  act  only  in  the 
darkness.  Why  should  it  not  be  the  same  with  the  spirits?  How 
can  we  understand  the  conditions  that  rule  them?  For  myself, 
I  have  no  doubt — the  very  fact  that  man,  beginning  with  the 
savage,  has  always  believed  in  them  is  proof  enough."  And  in 
his  interest,  he  stayed  talking  until  half  past  eleven. 

"The  Irish  girl  with  red  hair"  is  Jo.  He  made  experiments  also 
with  Maud:  "could  get  only  noises  from  sticky  fingers  on  the 
table,"  was  Mr.  Cole's  note  afterwards  of  one  of  these  experiments. 
The  subject  fascinated  him.  It  may  have  been  because  of  the 
Scotch,  the  McNeill,  blood  in  him.  He  was  evidently  something 
of  a  medium  while  his  brother,  the  Doctor,  had  curious  warnings 
or  presentiments — the  Scotch  second-sight — all  his  life,  we  were 
told  by  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler  who  gave  us  two  incidents.  In  Rich 
mond,  during  the  Civil  War,  suddenly  one  day  he  knew,  though 
he  did  not  know  how,  that  a  ship  under  a  flag  of  truce  was  coming 
into  a  near  port  and  that  his  mother,  whom  he  had  no  reason  to 
expect,  was  on  board.  On  the  strength  of  this,  he  got  leave,  started 
off  for  the  port,  and  arrived  just  in  time  to  meet  her.  Again,  the 
day  and  hour  E.  W.  Godwin  died,  he  knew  it,  said  so  to  his  wife, 
though  the  actual  news  did  not  reach  them  until  a  few  hours  later 
when  Whistler  brought  it.  More  than  this  once,  Whistler  spoke 
to  us  of  spirits  and  his  experiments  with  them.  Probably  nobody 

1900]  157 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

would  have  been  more  interested  than  he,  could  he  have  foreseen 
that  his  own  spirit  was  to  communicate  with  the  most  unlikely 
mediums,  was  even  to  dictate  a  book,  Echoes  of  Whistler,  to  Dr. 
L.  C.  Alexander,  whom  Shakespeare  had  already  honoured  as  the 
medium  to  take  down  his  biography  by  dictation,  revealing  among 
other  facts  that  his  grandfather  was  a  Jew.  Whistler's  communica 
tions  were  presented  in  such  un-Whis tier-like  fashion  that  critics 
and  public  failed  to  see  in  Dr.  Alexander  simply  the  medium 
through  whom  Whistler  was  speaking.  The  critics  cannot  be 
blamed.  We  would  never  have  imagined  the  book  had  not  been 
written  by  Dr.  Alexander  had  he  not  told  us  so  himself.  We  first 
heard  of  him  from  Clarence  B.  Mcllvaine,  then  London  repre 
sentative  of  Harpers.  He  was  lunching  with  us  to  talk  over  our 
Life  of  Whistler  which  the  Harpers  wanted  to  publish  in  America: — 

September  loth,  1906.  .  .  .  He  told  us  of  a  Dr.  L.  C.  Alexander — of 
whom  he  seemed  to  know  nothing  except  that  he  lived  at  Putney — 
who  had  asked  them  to  publish  a  volume  of  essays  by  Whistler 
which  Alexander  had  prepared  for  publication.  Naturally,  this 
brought  up  the  question  of  copyright,  and  it  came  out  that  he  was 
a  spiritualist  and  that  the  essays  were  communications  received 
from  Whistler  after  his  death.  It  was  arranged  that  Dr.  Alexander 
should  see  Miss  Philip  at  the  Harpers'  office,  and  after  some  corre 
spondence,  the  meeting  came  off,  but  Mcllvaine  kept  well  out  of 
the  way.  The  upshot  of  it  was  that  Miss  Philip  objected  to  the 
publication  and  Mcllvaine  had  not  heard  from  Dr.  Alexander  since. 

We  were  therefore  prepared  when  two  or  three  weeks  later  Dr. 
Alexander  wrote  to  J.  An  appointment  was  made. 

September  28th,  J.  to  the  National  Liberal  Club  to  meet  Dr. 
L.  C.  Alexander.  .  .  .  He  neither  knew  nor  saw  Whistler  during 
his  lifetime,  but  since  his  death  Whistler  had  communicated  to 
him  thirty  essays,  notes,  and  drawings.  Dr.  Alexander  sits  down, 
a  pen  in  his  hand,  and  his  hand  writes  of  itself,  at  times  draws,  the 
drawings  always  portraits,  caricatures  of  Whistler.  He  promises 
to  let  us  see  essays  and  drawings.  He  declares  himself  no  crank. 
He  founded  the  Royal  Historical  Society  and  the  Alexander  Medal, 
he  is  a  friend  of  Dr.  Ginsberg  and  many  men  of  repute.  But  here 
158  [19°° 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

is  a  fact  which  he  does  not  pretend  to  explain.  If  another  man 
were  to  come  and  tell  him  the  same  story  he  would  say  that  man 
was  mad.  But  there  it  is,  and  he  is  the  first  to  admit  it  extraor 
dinary.  His  impression  from  these  communications  is  that 
Whistler  laughed  because,  if  he  hadn't,  he  must  have  cried. 

He  sent  us  a  copy  of  his  book  when  it  was  published.  It  fell  flat, 
and  we  were  not  surprised.  It  is  dull,  the  one  thing  Whistler  never 
was,  and  we  have  not  to  this  day  been  able  to  read  it  through. 
The  drawings,  which  J.  saw  and  which  were  not  published,  were 
characterless  and  beneath  contempt,  the  whole  thing  a  pathetic, 
if  unconscious  fake.  There  is  not  the  slightest  hint  of  Whistler's 
character  in  the  book  or  the  drawings.  Whistler's  next  manifesta 
tions  reported  to  us  were  to  D.  S.  MacLaughlan,  and  from  him  too 
we  had  the  story  direct  four  years  later. 

March  ijth,  1910.  MacLaughlan's  wife  in  Nashville,  Tennessee, 
where  she  comes  from,  had  got  mixed  up  with  spiritualists  and 
people  who  held  seances,  to  which  he  often  went  with  her.  Once, 
when  they  were  trying  to  get  knocks  from  a  table,  and  only  one 
or  two  of  the  party  knew  anything  of  MacLaughlan,  a  message 
came  from  a  mysterious  spirit  whom  nobody  could  understand  at 
first.  Finally  they  asked  the  spirit  if  it  was  German?  Italian? 
French?  At  French,  the  table  fairly  danced.  It  explained  that 
it  was  an  artist,  J.  Herbert,  and  as  it  spoke  in  French,  the  Mac- 
Laughlans  afterwards  in  talking  of  the  affair  naturally  gave  a 
French  accent  to  its  name.  It  said  it  had  a  message  from  Whistler 
for  MacLaughlan.  Whistler  wished  MacLaughlan  to  go  on  with 
his  etching,  to  devote  himself  to  it.  The  French  in  which  this  was 
delivered  was  very  bad  indeed.  Ever  since  they  have  been  trying 
to  find  out  if  there  was  a  French  artist,  Herbert,  but  without  suc 
cess.  And  then  Joseph  told  MacLaughlan  that  J.  R.  Herbert,  the 
English  Royal  Academician,  who  knew  Whistler,  had  a  fad  of 
always  talking  in  French  which  was  bad,  and  the  mystery  seemed 
explained.  In  Florence,  the  MacLaughlans  attended  a  seance,  to 
which  Whistler's  own  spirit  came  and  told  MacLaughlan  that  he 
must  go  on  with  his  etching,  and,  after  other  spirits  had  spoken, 
announced  his  return  by  a  curious  knock  that  his  spirit  alone  gave. 
1900]  159 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

He  said  good-night  and  made  some  little  compliment  to  Mrs. 
MacLaughlan.  But  this,  MacLaughlan  admitted,  might  be  sug 
gestion.  They  had  been  reading  the  Life  and  had  been  struck  by 
what  we  say  in  it  about  Whistler's  charm  of  manner  to  women, 
and  also  about  his  unmistakable  knock  at  the  front  door.  What 
ever  the  explanation,  the  story  was  one  of  the  "amazing"  things 
Whistler  would  have  loved. 

MacLaughlan's  experiences  fired  us  with  a  desire  to  repeat  them. 
The  Sauters  were  as  excited,  and  a  seance  was  arranged  at  their 
house  of  which  E.  made  this  note. 

March  jist,  IQIO.  Mrs.  Sauter  had  quite  a  crowd:  Sauter  and 
herself,  ourselves,  the  MacLaughlans,  the  Withers,  the  Dulacs, 
Mrs.  Craies,  Miss  Hullah,  Mr.  Kendall.  The  seance  was  held  in 
the  studio,  round  a  large  mahogany  table  on  casters,  lights  out 
and  silence.  There  was  nothing  for  some  time.  Then  the  table 
trembled,  moved  about,  raised  itself  on  two  legs,  pushed  us  out 
of  our  chairs.  At  last  it  rapped,  but  in  answer  to  no  letter  of  the 
alphabet  except  W.,  when,  however,  excepting  once  or  twice,  it 
rapped  vigorously.  Occasionally  it  rapped  yes  or  no  to  a  question: 
No,  it  did  not  want  to  give  a  message  to  anybody.  No,  it  did  not 
want  music.  Yes,  it  did  want  something.  What?  A  drink. 
MacLaughlan  said  an  impish  power  was  about,  but  a  strong  one. 
It  was  asked  whether  its  name  was  William,  Wilfred  or  Winifred, 
Sauter  asked  it  in  German  whether  it  spoke  Italian  and  Mrs. 
Sauter  in  Italian  whether  it  spoke  German,  but  no  answer.  The 
fire  began  to  go  out.  The  studio  got  cold.  Sauter,  Joseph,  Withers 
and  Dulac  went  downstairs.  After  that,  no  more  "manifesta 
tions"  except  trembling  and  vibration,  and  at  last  everybody  de 
cided  too  to  go  down  and  "get  a  drink"  with  the  spirit.  As  we 
were  going,  Mrs.  Sauter  suddenly  regretted  that  nobody  had 
thought  of  asking  it  if  it  was  Whistler.  And  then  we  got  down 
stairs  to  be  told  by  J.  that  after  the  first  tremblings  and  pushings, 
which  he  fancied  came  from  one  or  another  of  the  party,  he  decided 
to  see  whether  this  was  so,  or  whether  a  power  stronger  than  he  was 
at  work,  and  the  rest  of  the  manifestations  came  from  his  long  legs! 
160  [1900 


WEARY 
Portrait  of  Jo 

DRY-POINT.       M.    Q2 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

General  dismay  and  disappointment.  But  for  all  that,  experiments 
were  tried  with  planchette.  MacLaughlan,  at  a  table  by  himself, 
with  a  clean  sheet  of  paper  before  him,  held  a  pencil  in  his  hand 
making  it  passive  for  the  "power"  to  write  with.  A  message  came: 
"  Whistler  is  among  you  this  evening.  He  wants  your  friends  to  try 
again."  Of  course  we  all,  excepting  Joseph  and  Sauter,  hurried  back 
to  seethe  thing  through.  The  table  could  not  be  induced  to  do  any 
thing  but  tremble.  And  we  went  home  as  unbelieving  as  we  came. 

Whistler  had  not  spoken  to  us  of  the  White  Girl  before  this  talk  of 
spirits  and  his  experiments  with  her,  though  already  references  to 
her  and  to  Maud  occur  in  more  than  one  of  our  notes.  It  was 
not  that  he  objected  to  talking  of  either.  He  often  did,  and  of 
Tillie,  and  Gussie  Jones  who  was  Sandys'  "little  girl,"  and  the 
other  models  who  posed  for  him.  It  was  simply  because  since 
The  Journal  was  begun  nothing  as  yet  in  the  talk  had  recalled  them. 
Jo — Joanna  HefTernan — drifted  into  his  studio  and  his  life  shortly 
after  he  settled  in  London,  in  the  late  Fifties  or  early  Sixties.  She 
was  the  daughter  of  an  Irishman,  Patrick  HefTernan,  described 
to  us  as  a  sort  of  Captain  Costigan,  "a  teacher  of  polite  chirog- 
raphy,"  who  used  to  speak  of  Whistler  as  "me  son-in-law."  Her 
beauty  was  great,  her  gold-red  hair  a  marvel.  And  she  was  not 
only  beautiful.  She  was  intelligent,  she  was  sympathetic.  She 
gave  Whistler  the  constant  companionship  he  could  not  do  without, 
for  he  was  more  than  most  men  dependent  upon  the  presence  and 
sympathy  of  women.  Her  beauty  lives  in  The  White  Girl,  The 
Little  White  Girl,  the  Note  Blanche  that  belonged  to  Mrs.  Walter 
Sickert  and  was  at  Knoedler's  the  last  time  we  saw  it.  She  is  one 
of  the  two  figures  in  the  Symphony  in  White  No.  Ill  and  In  the 
Studio,  she  reappears  in  the  Japanese  subjects  and  the  almost 
unknown  Six  Projects  which  the  public  will  soon  be  able  to  see  in 
the  Freer  Collection,  Washington.  If  the  paintings  were  to  perish, 
her  loveliness  would  survive  in  two  of  the  finest  of  Whistler's 
prints,  the  dry-points  Jo  and  Weary.  Her  devotion  kept  her  at 
his  side  in  the  studio  and  often  took  her  with  him  on  his  little 
journeys  from  London.  She  was  his  companion  in  the  old  inn  by 
the  riverside  where  he  stayed  in  1859  or  1860  and  painted  Wapping, 
in  it  grouping  her  with  Legros  and  a  man  said  by  Walter  Greaves 
to  be  one  of  his  father's  boatmen,  though  Whistler  had  not  then 
moved  into  his  first  Lindsey  Row  house  and  did  not  know  the 
Greaves — and  why  should  they  have  sent  their  man  to  Wapping? 
1900]  161 

ii 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

This  was  the  inn  where  the  Englishmen  and  Greeks  who  had  been 
Whistler's  fellow  students  in  Paris  sometimes  came  to  see  and  dine 
with  him,  and  many  were  the  stories  told  of  Whistler  there,  none 
he  liked  better  than  the  tale  of  the  maid  of  all  work  who,  when  he 
asked  her  what  she  had  for  breakfast,  said  "Bloaters."  "What 
are  bloaters?"  Whistler,  still  new  to  London,  asked.  "Why, 
'errings,  you  bloomin'  green'orn!" 

Jo  was  again  with  Whistler  in  Brittany  in  the  summer  of  1861, 
and  the  following  winter  in  Paris  when  he  had  his  studio  in  the 
Boulevard  des  Batignolles.  Drouet  remembered  his  pride  in  her 
beautiful  hair  and  the  way  he  drew  it  down  over  her  shoulders  to 
show  to  Courbet,  who  painted  her  as  La  Belle  Irlandaise — the 
picture  called,  we  cannot  say  why,  The  Fair  Dutch-woman  in  John 
C.  Vandyke's  Modern  French  Masters.  As  La  Belle  Jo  it  was 
exhibited  at  the  International  Society's  Exhibition  of  Fair  Women 
in  1910,  and  when  the  printer  of  the  Catalogue  changed  this  title 
to  La  Belle  70,  the  critics  were  prompt  to  accuse  Whistler  of  bor 
rowing  even  The  White  Girl's  hair  from  Courbet,  as  a  year  later 
they  proved  him  indebted  to  Greaves  for  his  nocturnes.  J.  had 
to  explain  that  La  Belle  lo  was  only  La  Belle  Jo,  Whistler's  well- 
known  model,  and  that  whatever  borrowing  may  have  been  done 
was  by  Courbet.  The  next  summer,  1862,  Jo  and  Whistler  were 
together  in  the  Pyrenees,  stopping  at  Guethary  and  Biarritz  where 
he  painted  The  Blue  Wave.  He  had  been  ordered  to  the  Pyrenees 
for  his  health  but  his  concern  was  for  Jo,  full  of  coughs,  requiring 
the  mild  air  of  the  South.  Their  plan  was  to  go  on  to  Madrid,  to 
Velazquez,  but  that  journey  never  came  off,  then  or  later,  many 
as  have  been  the  false  statements  to  the  contrary.  The  autumn 
of  1865  saw  them  both  at  Trouville  with  Courbet,  Whistler  paint 
ing  Courbet  on  the  Shore,  and  Jo  posing  to  Courbet  for  Les 
Irlandaises  and  studies  of  Bathers,  her  hair  a  glorious  note  of 
colour  in  them  all. 

Jo  shared  not  only  the  days  of  work  in  the  studio  and  the  journeys 
for  work  in  the  summer.  She  shared  Whistler's  troubles,  she  made 
them  hers.  She  was  first  of  all  his  model,  but  she  was  also  his 
agent,  his  messenger,  his  go-between  when  his  money  difficulties 
grew  pressing,  a's  they  did  from  the  beginning.  She  was  often  seen 
in  Bond  Street,  known  there  as  Mrs.  Abbott,  the  name  she  gave 
herself.  To  art  dealers  friendly  to  Whistler,  she  brought  sometimes 
her  own  work  to  sell,  for  she  drew  and  painted  a  little.  Oftener 
she  brought  Whistler's  and,  if  the  crisis  was  acute,  would  accept 
as  many  shillings  as  at  other  times  he  was  paid  pounds.  We  have 
seen  in  one  dealer's  house  drawings  bought  in  these  emergencies 

162  [1900 


•s  M 


\ 


[  > 

i 


t  Z  . 


SKETCH  OF  MAUD 

PEN-AND-INK 

Formerly  in  the  possession  of  S.  P.  Avery 


SKETCH   OF   MAUD 

PEN-AND-INK 

From  Arrangement  in  White  and 

Black  No.    i,   afterwards  called 

L'Americaine 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

from  Jo.  If  a  water-colour,  or  print,  or  drawing  of  too  great  im 
portance  slipped  into  Jo's  package,  a  line  would  follow  the  next  day 
from  Whistler — "you  know,  an  inadvertence  and  of  course  to  be 
returned."  And  it  was  returned,  for  there  were  London  dealers 
always  who  appreciated  Whistler  and  showed  him  the  considera 
tion  which  was  his  due.  Nor  were  these  the  only  troubles.  We 
have  never  heard,  except  from  Walter  Greaves  and  his  sister,  that 
Jo  had  a  son,  but  we  have  heard  from  many  that  she  adopted 
Whistler's  son  John,  whom  Whistler  called  "an  infidelity  to  Jo." 
She  watched  over  him,  brought  him  up  as  carefully  as  if  she  had 
been  his  mother,  and  Whistler,  who  had  gone  to  see  him  as  a  child, 
was  glad  to  have  his  support  as  a  man.  For  a  while  the  son  was 
Whistler's  secretary,  he  took  part  in  some  of  the  historic  events 
of  Whistler's  crowded  life.  Pellegrini,  who  lived  across  the  street 
from  the  White  House,  standing  at  his  window  one  night,  saw 
Whistler  come  out  with  John,  a  ladder,  a  candle,  paint  and  brushes, 
and  write  the  famous  inscription  on  the  lintel  of  the  door.  During 
the  exciting  days  of  the  British  Artists,  John  attended  to  much  of 
its  important  business.  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Whistler  knew  and  liked 
him  and  he  was  often  at  their  house  in  Wimpole  Street.  Mrs. 
Tom  Whistler,  when  she  came  to  see  us  with  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler,  said: 

Thursday,  March  2d,  ipn.  She  had  just  seen  Whistler's  son,  they 
were  staying  for  a  little  while  in  London  and  he  came  and  dined 
with  them.  They  found  him  "charming,  a  thorough  Whistler, 
very  like  his  father  in  appearance,  only  taller  and  with  a  better 
nose,  extremely  amusing  and  intelligent,  and  he  stayed  talking  to 
Mr.  Whistler  until  after  midnight." 

Also,  he  inherited  the  Whistler  genius  for  engineering  and  made  a 
good  position  for  himself.  The  misfortune  is  that  he  has  not 
inherited  the  Whistler  name.  People  who  knew  them  both  say  Jo 
and  the  son  were  at  Whistler's  funeral,  her  last  tribute  to  the  man 
who  made  her  famous  for  all  time.  She  is  immortal  because  of  the 
inspiration  she  was  to  him  in  his  art.  But  her  love  helped  him 
through  dark  moments  as  well  as  light,  and  was  an  inspiration  in 
his  life. 

In  the  Seventies,  Whistler's  work  shows  a  new  model — a  model 
with  red  hair,  but  not  Jo.  This  new  model  was  Maud — Maud 
Franklin  who  stood  for  The  Fur  Jacket,  UAmericaine,  Effie  Deans, 
for  many  etchings,  lithographs  and  water-colours,  none  more 
beautiful  than  a  water-colour  of  her  in  bed  reading  which  belonged 
1900]  163 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

to  Mr.  George  A.  Lucas.  He  showed  it  to  E.  when  she  saw  him 
in  Paris,  saying  "this  for  the  lover  of  Whistler  is  perfect."  It 
has  vanished  from  the  Lucas  collection  now  in  Baltimore.  She 
was  not  in  the  usual  sense  a  beautiful  woman — "not  pretty,  with 
prominent  teeth,  a  real  British  type,"  was  John  Alexander's  im 
pression.  But  in  paintings  and  prints  her  figure  is  slim  and  lithe 
and  graceful,  she  had  the  grande  dame  air,  dame  du  monde,  accord 
ing  to  M.  Duret,  and  the  colour,  the  splendour  of  her  hair  was  like 
Jo's.  Also  like  Jo's  were  her  unusual  intelligence,  her  rare  power 
of  sympathy  and  devotion,  and  Whistler's  need  of  both  was  never 
so  urgent.  His  fortunes  were  crumbling,  he  was  building  the  White 
House  and  getting  deeper  and  deeper  into  debt  over  it,  he  was 
plagued  by  the  coming  Ruskin  trial,  he  was  steering  straight  for 
the  bankruptcy  court  and  he  knew  it.  She  stuck  to  him  through 
these  evil  days,  not  only  posing  for  him,  but  lightening  his  burden 
of  work  and  debt  when  she  could,  printing  with  him — for,  in  this 
too  like  Jo,  she  was  something  of  an  artist;  writing  his  letters  for 
him  when  "the  show  was  so  frightfully  afire"  that  he  had  not 
time  to  write  himself;  getting  entangled  with  writs  and  bailiffs; 
facing  the  irrepressible  Nightingale,  builder  of  the  White  House, 
whose  name  crops  up  in  the  bankruptcy  papers,  now  in  our  pos 
session,  until  we  marvel  that  he  alone  was  not  the  end  of  Whistler; 
dragged  into  the  intricate  money  affairs  with  Howell,  her  name 
mentioned  more  than  once  in  his  journal  and  accounts.  She  was 
even  involved  in  the  intrigue  from  which  Whistler's  life  was  never 
free,  and  in  Whistler's  letters  to  Mr.  Lucas  now  in  the  Maryland 
Institute,  the  world  can  read  his  elaborate  arrangements  for  letters 
addressed  to  Miss  Maud  Franklin,  enclosed  in  his  and  sent  to  Paris, 
to  be  posted  back  from  that  town  to  the  White  House — why  no 
one  alive  to-day  can  tell.  Whistler,  bankrupt,  left  London  for 
Venice;  in  a  month  Maud  joined  him.  He  was  poorer  than  ever, 
so  poor  he  was  living  on  "cats'  meat  and  cheese  parings,"  he  used 
to  tell  the  artists  there.  But  Maud  fought  his  poverty  with  him, 
cooked  for  him,  kept  things  in  order  for  him,  posed  for  him,  posed 
for  others.  Even  one  day,  Oliver  Grover  told  J.,  when  Whistler 
was  biting  a  plate  on  top  of  his  bureau  in  which  were  his  shirts 
and  the  acid  began  to  run  off,  instead  of  pulling  the  shirts  out  of 
the  drawers  or  mopping  up  the  acid,  he  stood  perfectly  still, 
shouting  "Maud!  Maud!"  As  she  did  not  come,  Grover  had  to 
rescue  the  contents  of  the  bureau,  while  the  acid  ran  to  the  floor 
and  water  had  to  be  poured  on  that.  Only  love  could  have  kept 
Maud  with  Whistler  through  these  troubled  days  when  with  love 
alone  could  Whistler  repay  her.  John  Alexander  said: 

164  [1900 


* 


<*•*          1    t 


CASA  JAXKOVITZ,  WHERE  WHISTLER  LIVED  MOST  OF  THE  TIME  IN  VENICE 

PASTEL 

By  Joseph  Pennell 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


Jo  AND  MAUD 

November  6th,  1908.  "Her  devotion  was  wonderful  and  made 
Whistler's  later  conduct  to  her  unpardonable.  That  was  one  of 
the  things  those  who  loved  him  just  had  to  forget,  and  they  could 
for  they  understood.  To  those  who  do  not  understand,  of  course 
one  does  not  even  speak  of  the  necessity  of  forgetting." 

Perhaps  because  of  this  devotion,  this  daily  life  of  self-sacrifice, 
the  rumour  went  about  of  their  marriage,  the  ceremony  performed 
in  a  Venetian  church.  But  it  was  only  a  rumour.  It  is  certain 
that  Whistler,  who  introduced  her  to  artists  and  let  her  preside 
at  the  Venetian  versions  of  his  Chelsea  breakfasts,  did  not  take 
her  with  him  to  the  Bronsons  or  the  Curtises.  When  we  were 
writing  the  Life,  the  American  Consul  in  Venice  looked  up  city 
archives  and  church  records,  but  nothing  was  to  be  found. 
These  were  the  years  when  Whistler  said  he  had  no  private  life 
and  Maud  shared  in  the  publicity.  Back  in  London,  they  lived 
together.  First  in  Alderney  Street  where,  Miss  Chambers  told  us, 
it  was  whispered  at  one  moment  that  her  figure  looked  rather  queer 
and  she  went  to  Paris,  or  so  she  explained  to  friends,  and  stayed 
away  two  months.  From  others,  we  have  heard  of  a  daughter 
with  her  mother's  wonderful  hair.  This  daughter  and  John  are 
Whistler's  only  children  of  whom  we  have  a  positive  record,  though 
from  Mr.  Percy  Thomas,  during  a  visit  he  paid  us  on  October  4th, 
1906,  we  heard  of  four,  a  number  unconfirmed  by  any  one  else. 
On  her  return,  Whistler  and  Maud  moved  to  the  "Pink  Palace" 
in  Fulham,  then  to  The  Vale,  Chelsea.  Whistler,  though  he  sold 
his  etchings,  could  not  sell  his  pictures,  and  was  still  miserably 
poor.  Maud  did  everything  for  him,  as  in  Venice,  M.  Duret  says 
and  he  never  went  to  share  with  them  the  dinner  Maud  cooked 
without  a  bottle  of  wine  and  some  fruit  or  pastry  in  his  pockets. 
All  this  while  Maud  called  herself  Mrs.  Whistler,  and  was  known  as 
Mrs.  Whistler  to  Chelsea  tradesmen  and  cabmen.  Mrs.  Whistler 
was  engraved  on  her  cards,  Maud  Whistler  was  signed  to  her  letters : 
two  with  this  signature  were  published  by  Otto  Bacher  in  his  book 
about  Whistler  in  1908,  the  book  suppressed  by  Whistler's  execu 
trix,  though  not  because  of  Maud's  letters.  Some  of  Whistler's 
old  friends  say  that  he  introduced  her  and  spoke  of  her  to  them  as 
Mrs.  Whistler;  others,  that  Madame  was  his  name  for  her,  though 
he  might  occasionally  refer  to  her  as  "my  pupil."  She  was  seen 
in  many  places  with  him,  paid  week-end  visits  with  him,  was  promi 
nent  at  British  Artists'  functions  with  him,  where  M.  Duret  has 
told  us  that  he,  as  foreigner  and  garfon,  was  ready  to  give  her  his 
1900]  165 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

arm  if  the  respectable  native  hesitated.  Always  a  few  people 
accepted  her,  though  the  difficulty  came  after  Whistler  married. 
A  friend  was  quoted  to  us  as  saying  she  could  know  one  but  not 
two  Mrs.  Whistlers.  The  situation  was  of  a  kind  not  likely  to  be 
ignored  by  gossip,  and  gossip  made  the  most  of  it,  as  of  everything 
connected  with  Whistler.  It  was  an  impossible  state  of  affairs 
for  them  both.  If  the  few  accepted  Maud,  the  many  did  not. 
Whistler  loved  society,  and  to  most  houses  to  which  he  was  invited, 
Maud  did  not  go.  On  the  other  hand,  in  the  houses  to  which  she 
did  go  she  was  often  an  embarrassment.  She  would  stay  hours, 
Miss  Chambers  explained,  and  if  people  came  in,  there  was  no 
knowing  by  what  name  to  introduce  her.  Then  Whistler  would 
turn  up  and  fetch  her  away  and  it  was  uncomfortable  for  every 
body.  Both  had  high  tempers.  Gossip  rejoiced  in  tales  of  violent 
scenes  in  the  "Pink  Palace."  Details  are  in  Walter  Greaves'  talk 
with  J.  But  it  is  useless  to  revive  this  unpleasantness  of  the  past. 
All  who  knew  them  must  have  foreseen  the  end. 
Whistler  tired  of  so  intolerable  a  life.  Besides,  his  friendship  with 
Mrs.  Godwin  was  strengthening.  He  had  known  her  before  he 
went  to  Venice.  Godwin  was  his  friend,  the  architect  of  the  White 
House,  the  first  to  praise  his  Venetian  work  and  his  decorative 
scheme  for  its  exhibition,  which  was  a  joke  to  the  average  critic. 
Godwin  died  in  1886.  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler  told  us  (October  ist,  1906} 
that  he  was  buried  in  a  corner  of  a  field  somewhere  down  in  the 
country  and  Mrs.  Godwin,  Lady  Archibald  Campbell  and  Whistler 
had  gone  with  the  coffin,  in  some  sort  of  an  open  cart,  and  they 
had  covered  up  the  coffin  and  made  quite  a  picnic  of  it — perhaps 
what  all  funerals  ought  to  be  made  if  taken  in  the  right  way.  Mrs. 
Godwin  lived  in  Chelsea  after  her  husband's  death,  and  gradually 
came  more  and  more  often  to  the  studio.  Lady  Colin  Campbell, 
then  sitting — or  rather  standing — for  her  portrait,  was  inclined  to 
resent  the  daily  interruption,  Mrs.  Godwin's  arrival  being  the  signal 
for  work  to  stop.  She  chaffed  Whistler  about  "the  little  widdie," 
but  chaff  could  not  reconcile  her  to  the  loss  of  her  portrait  which 
was  never  finished  and  disappeared  after  it  was  exhibited  at  the 
British  Artists — destroyed  by  Whistler,  Miss  Philip  informed  her. 
Maud  had  not  only  a  high  temper,  but  the  jealousy  that  goes  with 
it.  Her  resentment  had  a  more  serious  reason,  than  Lady  Colin's, 
and  the  position  grew  strained  beyond  endurance.  The  crisis  came 
with  the  exhibition  of  the  British  Artists  in  1887.  William  Stott 
of  Oldham  showed  a  Venus  with  red  hair  which  gossip  declared 
was  Maud's.  Her  portrait  by  Whistler — the  portrait  in  bonnet 
and  furs  owned  by  Mrs.  Walter  Sickert  and  by  her  returned  to 

166  [190x5 


(.See  page  765) 


WHISTLER'S  HOUSE  IN  THE  VALE,  CHELSEA 

PHOTOGRAPH 

By  W.  E.  Gray 


THE  DYKE  AT  DOMBURG 

WATER-COLOUR 


(See  page  I7Q) 


SHORE  NEAR  DUBLIN 

OIL 

Freer  Collection,  National  Museum,  Washington 


(See   past   180) 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

Whistler — was  in  another  room:  "the  lady  in  her  right  clothing," 
the  critics  wrote.  There  was  excitement,  talk,  and  Whistler's 
indignation  was  natural,  whether  or  no  he  believed  the  scandal. 
A  little  later  Maud  went  to  stay  with  the  Stotts.  While  she  was 
away,  he  left  the  house  in  The  Vale,  never  to  return.  A  tie  so 
deliberately  broken  could  not  be  mended.  In  1888  Whistler  mar 
ried  Mrs.  Godwin.  Mrs.  Jopling-Rowe,  who  went  with  Mrs. 
Godwin  to  the  church,  thought  Whistler  was  uneasy  during  the 
ceremony,  he  looked  from  side  to  side  as  if  in  fear  that  Maud 
might  be  there. 

Maud  did  not  accept  the  inevitable  by  amiably  effacing  herself. 
When  the  Whistlers  took  their  apartment  in  the  Rue  du  Bac,  she 
arrived  in  Paris  and  rented  an  apartment  in  the  neighborhood. 
She  did  not  drop  the  Mrs.  Whistler  from  her  cards.  It  was  not 
pleasant  for  Whistler.  But  then,  it  was  not  pleasant  for  her.  She 
was  poor  and  alone.  She  returned  to  her  profession,  trying  through 
M.  Duret,  to  pose,  among  others,  to  Miss  Mary  Cassatt.  In  the 
end,  she  married  a  rich  South  American.  When  we  were  writing 
the  Life,  E.  called  on  her.  The  husband  had  died,  she  was  a 
wealthy  widow  with  her  motor,  her  town  house  not  far  from 
1'Etoile,  her  country  house.  She  was  not  home  the  day  of  E.'s 
visit,  nor  the  next  day  when  she  was  expected  and  E.  had  said  she 
would  return.  Madame  found  the  country  in  springtime  too  en 
chanting  and  was  prolonging  her  stay,  the  bonne  regretted,  and 
all  the  time  E.  suspected  that  Madame  was  peeping  through  the 
blinds.  Afterwards  Maud  wrote.  She  preferred  to  say  nothing 
of  the  past.  We  cannot  blame  her.  She  had  loved  much,  she  had 
suffered  much.  It  is  something  that  her  last  years  are  quiet  and 
untroubled.  But  her  love  and  her  suffering  were  for  a  great  man, 
a  genius,  and  therefore  cannot  be  forgotten.  She  will  live  forever 
with  Rembrandt's  Hendrickje  and  Leonardo's  Monna  Lisa. 


CHAPTER  XI:  WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  AND  OTHER 
THINGS  OF  EARLY  DAYS.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Sunday,  August  4th,  1900.  Whistler  came  in  the  morning  to  see 
J.  who  got  back  from  Scotland  yesterday.  He  was  worried,  he 
looked  tired  and  bothered.  "Well,  you  know,  Mrs.  and  Miss 
Philip  have  taken  a  house  or  part  of  a  house  on  the  seashore  near 
Dublin  and  I  suppose  I  ought  to  start  to-morrow.  And  Elwell 
1900]  167 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

wants  me  to  go  to  a  little  place  near  Middleburg  in  Holland,  and 
that  seems  nice  and  I  would  like  it,  but  I  am  afraid  it  is  not  on  the 
way  to  Ireland.  Matters  with  Abram  have  come  to  a  crisis.  Abram 
said  the  last  two  drawings  were  printed  with  the  text,  and  that 
makes  the  difference,  and  he  suggested  ten  pounds  a  piece  and  I 
thought  perhaps  the  whole  thing  might  just  as  well  be  settled." 
He  came  back  to  dinner  in  the  evening.  The  Fisher  Unwins  were 
here.  I  was  talking  to  Fisher  and  did  not  hear  the  beginning,  but 
something  started  Whistler  on  the  Eden  question,  and  he  told  the 
story  he  had  told  me  before  of  the  sale  at  Christie's,  and  that  led 
him  back  to  the  whole  business  of  the  valentine — and  how  he 
deliberately  deposited  the  cheque,  so  the  truth  should  be  known, 
and  the  Baronet  should  not  have  the  chance  to  go  around,  shaking 
his  head,  and  saying  "some  little  unpleasantness  about  money, 
you  know."  The  Baronet  won  the  first  case,  but  when  it  came 
to  the  appeal  and  the  Cour  de  Cassation,  when  the  circumstances 
were  understood,  and  the  judge  realized  what  an  espece  d'amateur, 
speculateur  and  collectioneur^  he  was,  why,  then,  there  was  no 
escape  for  him. 

Sargent,  again,  was  the  subject.  "Really,"  Whistler  said,  "his 
painting  seems  almost  like  the  work  of  a  bad  boy,  and  I  do  not 
know  whether  he  ought  not  to  be  taken  out  and  whipped  for  it." 
I  did  not  hear  half  the  talk,  but  there  was  a  wild  argument  with 
Mrs.  Unwin  about  the  negroes.  "They  never  had  had  a  chance," 
she  declared.  "Chance!  Why  there  they  all  were  starting  out 
alike,  white,  black,  brown,  yellow  and  red  men — what  better  chance 
could  they  have?  What?"  After  the  Unwins  had  gone,  he  said 
again  as  he  did  after  Mrs.  Whitman  had  gone  home  a  week  ago, 
that  he  ought  not  to  talk  about  Sargent.  "I  like  Sargent,  and  I 
am  afraid  if  these  things  are  repeated,  people  will  get  the  idea 
that  I  am  ill-natured  and  that  is  absurd.  I  may  be  wicked,  but — 
what? — never  ill-natured!" 

The  subject  of  payment  for  his  work  reproduced  in  the  papers 
often  came  up.  Like  most  painters,  except  Royal  Academicians 
and  French  professors,  Whistler  for  many  years — unless  it  was  a 
question  of  publishing  his  etchings  about  which  he  was  keen  enough 
168  [1900 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

— allowed  editors  to  use  his  work  for  nothing,  he  even  made  draw 
ings  of  his  pictures  for  them  and  charged  no  more.  It  was  not 
until  J.  pointed  out  that  he  was  throwing  a  fortune  away  when  he 
might  have  been  making  one,  with  Alma-Tadema  and  Holman 
Hunt  and  Frith  who  grew  rich  on  the  prints  after  their  pictures, 
that  he  demanded  to  be  paid  for  his.  But,  alas!  in  most  cases,  as 
in  the  case  of  the  Mother,  the  most  popular  picture  of  modern 
times,  he  had  parted  with  the  copyright,  and  from  the  endless 
reproductions  published  in  all  sorts  of  forms  and  all  over  the  world, 
he  never  received  a  cent  and  was  never  offered  one  by  the  print 
publishers  who  owed  so  much  to  him.  The  royalties  received  by 
the  publishers  made  their  fortunes  and  would  have  made  his. 
Josey's  mezzotints,  arranged  for  by  Howell  with  the  Greaves,  were 
the  exceptions.  But  by  the  time  of  which  we  write,  he  had 
begun  to  understand  the  value  of  royalties  and  fees  for  rights 
of  reproduction. 

Sunday,  August  $th.  J.  had  promised  to  go  to  Whistler's  studio 
to-day,  but  did  not  feel  up  to  it  and  I  went  to  explain.  I  found  Elwell 
sitting  for  his  portrait,  and  tea  on  the  table.  "We  must  have  tea 
at  once,  before  it  gets  cold,"  Whistler  said,  and  he  went  on  painting. 
About  ten  minutes  later,  he  said  "we  must  have  tea  at  once,"  and 
again  he  painted  on.  And  we  waited  a  good  half  hour  before  he 
could  lay  down  his  brush,  and  then  it  was  to  put  the  canvas  in  a 
frame  under  glass,  and  look  at  it  for  another  ten  minutes.  Still 
worrying  about  his  rashness  in  speaking  of  Sargent,  "People  might 
misunderstand — they  are  so  oppressed  now  with  the  conviction  of 
Sargent's  cleverness,  and  it  is  cleverness  which  has  nothing  to  do 
with  art.  It  is  the  same  sort  of  cleverness  as  that  of  the  officer  who 
cuts  an  orange  into  fancy  shapes  after  dinner.  My  standard  is 
the  Louvre.  What  is  not  worthy  to  go  in  the  Louvre  has  nothing 
to  do  with  art."  [And  the  Mother  is  there  now.]  Often  and  often 
he  would  work  on  into  the  dark  till  he  really  could  not  see — by  the 
firelight  over  our  portraits  and  when  one  tried  to  stop  him  he 
would  say  there  is  so  much  to  do,  so  little  time  to  do  it. 
Monday,  August  6th.  Whistler  came  to  dinner — only  half  an  hour 
late.  He  was  grumbling  at  the  cold  and  the  rain,  but,  for  all  that  was 
in  unusually  good  form.  No  special  news  from  the  Boers  except  that 
Baden-Powell  was  still  appearing  in  his  usual  role  of  the  Besieged. 
1900]  169 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Then  he  read  us  one  of  Nevinson's  letters  from  South  Africa  in 
The  Daily  Chronicle,  with  which  he  was  much  struck,  Nevinson 
saying  that  it  was  a  question  of  manners,  and  that  the  whole 
future  relation  of  the  two  races  down  there  would  depend  on  the 
women — both  points  that  specially  appeal  to  him. 
He  was  full  of  reminiscences,  again  of  Rossetti  and  Howell — the 
Owl — and  the  house  in  Chelsea.  Howell,  he  again  compared  to  the 
people  in  Gil  Bias  or  Robinson  Crusoe — he  was  like  the  illustrations 
in  Gil  Bias — men  in  top-boots  and  feathers  and  magnificently  flam 
boyant.  He  lied  with  splendour.  He  gave  us  again  Rossetti's 
limerick — 

There's  a  Portuguee  person  called  Howell 
Who  lays  on  his  lies  with  a  trowel. 

"Once  in  a  while,  I  would  take  my  gaiety,  my  sunniness,  to  Ford 
Madox  Brown's  receptions.  And  there  were  always  the  most 
wonderful  people — the  Blinds,  Swinburne,  anarchists,  poets, 
musicians,  all  kinds  and  sorts,  and  in  an  inner  room  Rossetti  and 
Mrs.  Morris  sitting  side  by  side,  in  state,  being  worshipped,  and, 
fluttering  around  them,  Howell  with  a  broad  red  ribbon  across  his 
shirt  front,  a  Portuguese  decoration  hereditary  in  his  family." 
It  was  at  the  time  the  large  fair  person  Rossetti  painted  as  Lilith, 
and  called  The  Sumptuous,  presided  at  Rossetti's,  when  Swin 
burne  and  Meredith  and  Sandys  were  living  there,  the  time  when 
the  most  wonderful  birds  and  beasts  were  in  Rossetti's  collection: 
"the  gazelle  and  peacock  who  fought,  until  the  peacock  was  left 
standing  desolate  with  its  tail  apart  strewed  upon  the  ground;  and 
the  bull — the  bull  of  Bashan — Rossetti  bought  at  Cremorne, 
brought  home  by  two  men,  led  through  the  hall,  out  into  the  garden 
at  the  back,  and  its  rope  fastened  to  a  stake.  Rossetti  used  to 
come  and  talk  to  it.  One  day  the  bull  got  so  excited  it  pulled  up 
the  stake  and  made  for  Rossetti,  who  went  running  round  the 
garden,  tearing  round  and  round  a  tree,  a  little  fat  person  with 
coat  tails  flying,  until,  at  last  he  managed  to  rush  up  the  garden 
stairs  and  slam  the  door  in  the  face  of  the  bull.  Then  he  called 
his  man  and  ordered  him  to  go  and  tie  up  the  bull,  and  the  man, 
170  [1900 


ENLARGEMENT  OF   ETCHING   BLACK  LION  WHARF  PUBLISHED  IN  THE 
DAILY  CHRONICLE 


ILLUSTRATION      TO      LITTLE 
JOHANNES 

Drawing  on  Wood 
(See  page  306) 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

who  had  looked  out  for  the  rest  of  the  menagerie,  who  had  gone 
about  the  house  with  peacocks  and  other  creatures  under  his  arm, 
rescued  armadilloes,  captured  monkeys  from  the  tops  of  chimneys, 
struck  when  it  came  to  tying  up  a  Bull  of  Bashan  on  the  rampage, 
and  gave  a  month's  warning.  I  told  the  story  everywhere,  and 
Rossetti  never  seemed  quite  to  like  my  telling  it." 
Then  there  were  reminiscences  of  Sandys  and  his  love  affairs:  "the 
Gypsy"— "The  little  girl."  Then  reminiscences  of  himself.  "Be 
fore  I  left  America  I  painted  portraits  of  Annie  Denny,  my  cousin, 
and  Tom  Winans,  and  many  pictures  at  Stonington.  Then  in 
Paris,  when  I  was  first  studying,  Captain  Williams  from  Stoning 
ton;  Stonington  Bill  they  called  him,  got  me  to  paint  his  portrait, 
and  then  gave  me  a  commission  to  copy  as  many  pictures  as  I 
chose  for  twenty-five  dollars  a  piece,  and  I  copied  a  picture,  I 
cannot  remember  whom  it  was  by,  of  a  snow  scene,  with  a  horse 
and  a  soldier  standing  by  it  and  another  in  the  snow  at  his  feet; 
a  second  of  St.  Luke,  with  his  halo  and  draperies;  a  third  of  a 
woman  holding  up  a  child  toward  a  barred  window  and  a  man 
seen  looking  through  the  bars;  and  a  fourth  of  an  inundation. 
I  have  no  doubt  I  made  something  very  interesting  out  of  them. 
There  were  very  wonderful  things  even  then,  the  beginning  of 
harmonies  and  purple  schemes.  I  suppose  it  must  have  been 
intuitive.  Then  for  another  Stonington  man,  I  painted — copied — 
Ingres'  Andromeda^  chained  to  the  rock.  Probably  all  these  arc 
still  at  Stonington  and  are  shown  as  wonderful  things  by  Whistler! 
But  I  can  remember,  even  before  I  went  back  to  America,  the 
wonderful  things  I  did.  In  London,  once,  when  I  was  given  a  hot 
foot  bath,  I  remember  how  I  sat  looking  at  my  foot  and  then  got 
paper  and  colours  and  set  to  work  to  make  a  study  of  it.  Even 
in  Russia,  I  was  always  doing  that  sort  of  thing." 
His  friend  Ernest  died  after  the  war.  And  there  was  another 
delightful  story  of  him  and  his  ingenuity  in  supplying  himself  with 
canvas  and  brushes  and  paints  when  he  wanted  to  make  a  copy 
in  the  Louvre.  He  had  finished  a  picture  of  the  Marriage  Feast 
at  Cana  on  a  large  canvas,  and  he  wanted  to  sell  it.  He  and  a 
friend  started  out  one  morning,  carrying  it  between  them  very 
1900]  171 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

jauntily  to  find  some  one  to  buy  it.  They  crossed  the  Seine  first 
and  offered  it  for  five  hundred  francs  to  all  the  great  dealers  on  the 
right  side.  Then  they  offered  it  for  two  hundred  and  fifty  to  the 
little  dealers  on  the  left.  Then  they  went  back  and  offered  it  for 
one  hundred  and  twenty-five.  Then  they  came  across  and  offered  it 
for  seventy-five.  And  back  again  for  twenty-five  and  over  again 
for  ten.  And  they  had  an  awful  day,  getting  very  thirsty,  stopping 
with  it  at  cafes,  leaning  it  up  against  chairs  or  tables.  Until,  at 
last,  crossing  once  more  to  try  and  get  rid  of  it  for  five,  on  the 
Pont-des-Arts  they  had  an  idea.  They  lifted  it.  "Un"  they 
said,  with  a  great  swing — "deux — trois — Flan\"  and  over  it  went 
into  the  water.  There  was  a  cry  from  the  crowd,  a  rush  to  their 
side  of  the  bridge,  ser  gents -de -ville,  boats  on  the  river,  an  immense 
success  and  they  were  enchanted. 

Another  story  of  his  own  work.  When  he  made  his  etchings  in 
Venice  and  gave  them  to  the  Fine  Art  Society,  little  Brown  showed 
them  to  old  Mackay  at  Colnaghi's.  But  Mackay  would  not  have 
them:  he  wanted  the  London  etchings.  But,  Brown  said,  when 
the  London  etchings  were  offered  to  him  he  had  not  wanted  them. 
No,  Mackay  said,  then  he  wanted  dogs  by  Landseer.  "It  was 
when  I  was  doing  my  Venice  etchings  that  I  got  in  the  habit, 
as  I  worked,  of  blowing  away  the  little  powder  raised  by  the 
needle  ploughing  through  the  ground  to  the  copper,  and  it  got 
to  be  such  a  habit  that  I  made  the  same  blowing  sound,  even 
when  I  was  painting  or  drawing  and  there  was  nothing  to  blow. 
But  I  was  not  conscious  of  it.  After  the  school  was  started  in 
Paris,  Carmen  told  me  that,  one  day,  after  I  had  been  painting 
something  before  the  students  and  had  left  the  studio,  there  was 
suddenly  heard  in  the  silence  a  sound  of  blowing  from  one  corner. 
Then  another  student  began  to  blow  away  imaginary  things  as 
he  worked,  and  so  they  kept  it  up  one  after  the  other.  Tiens, 
they  said,  already  we  have  la  maniere,  and  that  is  much!  Since 
then,  I  have  broken  myself  of  the  habit  almost  altogether." 
J.  asked  him  about  Gleyre's  studio,  whether  there  was  much  of  the 
usual  tormenting  of  the  nouveaut  "No — very  little.  If  a  man 
was  a  decent  fellow,  and  would  sing  his  song  and  take  a  little  chaff, 
172  [1900 


THE  QUADRI,  VENICE 

PASTEL 

By  Joseph  Pennell 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

he  had  no  trouble.  I  only  remember  one  performance  of  the  kind, 
and  that  was  when  a  student,  who  had  already  been  there  some 
time,  seemed  too  pleased  with  himself,  too  certain  he  was  going 
to  be  made  massier.  And  one  morning  when  I  came  to  the  studio 
late,  I  found  them  all  working  very  hard,  the  unpopular  one 
among  them,  and  there  at  the  end  of  the  room,  on  the  model's 
stand  was  an  enormous  catafalque,  a  wonderful  construction,  the 
unpopular  one's  name  on  it  in  big  letters.  No  one  said  a  word. 
But  that  killed  him.  He  was  never  again  seen  in  the  place." 

Even  when  Whistler  taught  he  was  not  taken  up  by  the  French 
Professors.  One  night  at  the  American  Club,  after  Wanamaker 
and  the  Professors  and  the  Ambassador  and  all  the  lights  had 
spoken,  he  was  called  on  by  somebody.  He  said  he  hesitated  to 
follow  such  distinguished  speakers,  but  he  would  like  to  say  that 
in  France  they  taught  the  student  which  end  of  the  brush  to  put 
in  his  mouth,  but  in  England  it  was  all  a  matter  of  taste.  "Little 
Brown"  was  Ernest  G.  Brown,  first  with  the  Fine  Art  Society, 
and  later  head  of  the  firm  of  Ernest  G.  Brown  and  Phillips  of  the 
Leicester  Galleries,  Leicester  Square.  He  died  shortly  before  the 
war.  Why  everybody  called  him  "little  Brown"  it  would  be  hard 
to  say,  but  everybody  did — a  term  of  endearment  perhaps,  for 
everybody  liked  him.  He  believed  in  Whistler  from  the  first,  and 
Whistler  appreciated  it.  Pretty  Nelly  Brown  who  sat  for  one  of 
Whistler's  later  portraits  is  Brown's  daughter.  Whistler  in  the  Rue 
du  Bac  had  not  yet  broken  himself  of  the  habit  of  blowing.  Mrs. 
Whistler  used  to  say  that  when  he  blew,Ut  meant  he  was  satisfied. 

Thursday,  August  9.  Blaikie  came  to  dinner,  and  also  Whistler, 
bringing  with  him  Elwell,  the  American  artist  whose  portrait  he  is 
painting.  First  talk  of  Scotland,  Whistler,  as  a  McNeill  of  Barra, 
claiming  Blaikie  as  a  countryman,  not  a  drop  or  touch  of  Sassenach 
in  him,  he  said.  Whistler  is  an  Irish  name,  and  the  McNeill,  of 
course,  means  Barra.  Blaikie  told  the  story  of  the  time  so  many  of 
the  Barra  Islanders  emigrated  to  America.  The  McNeill  did  not  like 
it  at  all,  and  he  came  down  to  the  harbour  to  remonstrate  with  one 
of  the  clan.  But  the  man  was  obstinate,  until  finally  the  McNeill 
in  a  fury  struck  him  and  knocked  him  down.  Then,  when  the  man 
got  up,  he  was  ashamed  and  told  him  he  must  strike  him  in  return. 
1900]  173 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

"What,  strike  my  chief?"  the  man  said,  "never,  and,  what  is 
more  I'll  blow  out  the  brains  of  anyone  else  who  tries  to."  And 
yet  he  went  away  all  the  same,  but  it  shows  the  feeling  there  is  up 
there  for  the  chief — a  feeling  which  no  one  could  appreciate  better 
than  Whistler. 

Then  it  was  Edinburgh  and  the  Castle,  and  the  wonder  of  it  one 
day  when  Blaikie  took  St.  Gaudens  there.  It  was  Sunday,  and  they 
got  in  only  by  permission  of  the  Governor,  and  there  was  no  one 
else  from  outside,  and  the  wonder  of  it  in  a  thick  mist,  the  figures 
of  the  Highlanders  in  their  long  overcoats,  looming  up  through  it 
like  giants,  and,  everywhere,  mystery  when  you  leaned  over  the 
parapet  and  looked  apparently  into  space.  "That  is  just  the  sort 
of  thing,  the  mystery  of  it  all,  that  I  have  been  trying  to  show 
people  for  years,"  Whistler  said.  "But  people  do  not  want  it. 
What  they  like,  is  when  the  east  wind  blows  and  everything  is 
sharp  and  hard  and  awful — they  like  the  sort  of  a  day  when,  if 
you  look  across  the  river,  you  can  count  the  wires  in  the  canary 
bird's  cage  on  the  other  side.  They  talk  about  the  blue  skies  of 
Italy;  the  skies  of  Italy  are  not  blue,  they  are  black.  You  do  not 
see  blue  skies  except  in  Holland,  or  here,  or  countries  where  you 
get  great  white  clouds,  and  then  the  spaces  between  are  blue." 
He,  later,  told  the  story  of  Carlyle  and  the  painting  of  the  portrait 
more  completely  than  before,  that  is  to  us.  "There  were  ladies  in 
Chelsea — well — Madame  Venturi,  who  was  determined  that  I 
should  paint  it.  I  used  to  go  often  to  Madame  Venturi's.  I  met 
Mazzini  there,  and  Mazzini  was  most  charming.  Madame  Venturi 
often  visited  me,  and  one  day  she  brought  Carlyle.  The  Mother 
was  there,  and  Carlyle  saw  it  and  seemed  to  feel  in  it  a  certain 
fitness  of  things  as  Madame  Venturi  meant  he  should.  He  liked 
the  simplicity  of  it,  the  old  lady  sitting  with  her  hands  in  her  lap, 
and  he  said  he  would  be  painted.  And  he  came  one  morning  soon, 
and  he  sat  down,  and  I  had  the  canvas  ready,  and  my  brushes  and 
palette,  and  Carlyle  said,  And  now,  mon,  fire  away!  That  wasn't 
my  idea  of  how  work  should  be  done,  and  Carlyle  realized  it  for 
he  added,  If  ye're  fighting  battles  or  painting  pictures,  the  only 
thing  to  do  is  to  fire  away.  One  day  he  told  me  of  others  who  had 
174  [1900 


PORTRAIT  OF  CARLYLE 
OIL 

Glasgow  Art  Gallery 


SKETCH  OF  THE  PORTRAIT 

PEN-AND-INK 

Owned  by  Alan  S.  Cole,  C.  B. 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

painted  his  portrait.  There  was  Mr.  Watts,  a  mon  of  note.  And 
I  went  to  his  studio,  and  there  was  much  meestification,  and  screens 
were  drawn  round  the  easel,  and  curtains  were  drawn,  and  I  was 
not  allowed  to  see  anything.  And  then  at  last,  the  screens  were 
put  aside,  and  there  I  was.  And  I  looked.  Mr.  Watts,  a  great 
mon,  he  said  to  me,  How  do  you  like  it?  And  I  turned  to  Mr. 
Watts,  and  I  said,  Mon,  I  would  have  ye  know,  I  am  in  the 
hobit  of  wuring  clean  lunen.  But  Carlyle  agreed  that  I  had  given 
him  clean  linen  and  he  liked  the  portrait — he  told  people  afterward 
that  he  had  been  there,  talking  and  talking,  and  that  I  had  just 
gone  on  with  my  work,  and  had  paid  no  attention  to  him  whatever. 
Then  I  was  ill,  and  Carlyle  sent  me  one  of  the  machines  for  making 
soda-water  that  he  probably  had  used  when  he  was  ill  himself; 
and  then,  afterwards  I  called  and  spent  an  evening  with  him,  and 
our  relations  were  always  charming.  Carlyle  was  really  a  very 
delightful  person  about  whom  delightful  things  were  told.  Ailing- 
ham,  at  one  time,  was  by  way  of  being  his  Boswell  and  was  always 
at  his  heels.  They  were  walking  in  the  Embankment  Gardens, 
Chelsea,  when  Carlyle  stopped  suddenly:  Have  a  care  mon,  have 
a  care,  for  ye  have  a  tur-r-rable  faculty  for  developing  into  a  bore. 
Carlyle  had  been  reading  about  Michael  Angelo  and  had  had 
some  idea  of  writing  his  life  or  an  essay  about  him.  But  it  was 
Michael  Angelo,  the  engineer,  who  interested  him.  Another  day, 
walking  with  Allingham,  they  passed  South  Kensington  Museum. 
You  had  better  go  in,  Allingham  said.  Why,  mon,  only  fools  go  in 
there.  Allingham  explained  that  there  was  sculpture  by  Michael 
Angelo,  and  Carlyle  should  know  something  of  his  art  before  writing 
his  life.  No,  Carlyle  said,  we  need  only  glance  at  that! 
A  story  of  Blaikie's  was  interesting  too.  The  students  in  Edin 
burgh  elected  Carlyle  to  the  Rectorship,  and  he  was  pleased  enough 
at  the  election.  But  he  had  to  make  a  speech  afterwards,  and 
on  the  day  of  the  ceremonies,  he  arrived  in  his  official  robes, 
trembling  all  over.  First  he  threw  off  the  gown  and  cap,  but  you 
could  still  see  his  hands  tremble,  and  he  could  scarcely  control 
his  voice.  But  once  he  had  started,  he  dropped  his  notes,  and 
forgot  himself  entirely  in  what  he  had  to  say. 
1900] 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Then  the  talk  drifted  to  the  British  Artists,  and  Whistler  told 
again  the  story  of  the  Prince  of  Wales,  and  of  their  coming  to  ask 
him  to  join  the  Society.  Then  he  went  on  with  the  story  of  his 
relations  to  the  Society.  "There  was  the  Jubilee.  Well,  you  know, 
I  found  that  the  Academy  and  the  Institute,  and  the  rest  of  them 
were  preparing  addresses  to  the  Queen,  and  so  I  went  to  work  too, 
and  I  prepared  a  most  wonderful  address.  Instead  of  the  illumi 
nated  performances  for  such  occasions,  I  took  a  dozen  sheets  of 
my  old  Dutch  paper.  I  had  them  bound  by  Zaensdorf.  Amazing! 
First  came  this  beautiful  binding  in  yellow  morocco,  and  the  in 
scription  to  Her  Majesty,  every  word  just  in  the  right  place,  most 
wonderful.  You  opened  it,  and  on  the  first  page  you  found  a 
beautiful  little  drawing  of  the  royal  arms  that  I  made  myself;  the 
second  page,  an  etching  of  Windsor,  as  though,  l  here's  where  you 
live.'  On  the  third  page,  the  address  began.  I  made  decorations 
all  round  the  text  in  water-colour — at  the  top,  the  towers  of  Wind 
sor,  down  one  side,  a  great  battleship,  plunging  through  the  waves, 
and  below  the  sun  that  never  sets  on  the  British  Empire — What? 
The  following  pages  were  not  decorated,  just  the  most  wonderful 
address,  explaining  the  age  and  dignity  of  the  Society,  its  devotion 
to  Her  Glorious,  Gracious  Majesty,  and  suggesting  the  honour  it 
would  be  if  this  could  be  recognized  by  a  title  that  would  show  the 
Society  to  belong  especially  to  Her.  Then  the  last  page.  Then 
you  turned,  and  there  was  a  little  etching  of  my  house  at  Chelsea — 
'And  now  here's  where  I  live!'  And  then  you  closed  it,  and  on  the 
back  of  the  cover  was  the  Butterfly.  This  was  all  done  and  was 
well  on  its  way,  and  not  a  word  was  said  to  the  Society,  when  the 
Committee  wrote  and  asked  me  if  I  would  come  to  a  meeting  as 
they  wished  to  consult  me.  It  was  about  an  address  to  Her 
Majesty — all  the  other  Societies  were  sending  them  and  they 
thought  they  should  too.  I  asked  what  they  proposed  spending, 
and  they  were  aghast  when  I  suggested  that  the  guinea  they 
mentioned  might  not  meet  a  twentieth  of  the  cost.  But,  you  know, 
all  the  time  my  beautiful  address  was  on  its  way  to  Windsor,  and, 
finally  came  the  Queen's  acknowledgment  and  Her  command  that 
the  Society  should  be  called  Royal.  Well,  I  carried  this  to  a  meet 
ing,  and  it  was  stormy.  One  member  got  up  and  protested  against 
176  [1900 


LION 

PEN-AND-INK 

Designed  for  the  British  Artists 


lie  linmujc  am*  Dutiful  Iftrmatwl  af  tlir 
mu>crtiigm*d  in  (triralf  uf «  Saticti; 

ntu*ii  taitlj  f  ttl Suinr  ctvi. 


. ,— : 


FIRST  PAGE  OF  THE  MEMORIAL  TO  QUEEN  VICTORIA 

WATER-COLOUR 

From  the  British  Artists.    Royal  Collection,  Windsor 


^ 


L 


INTERIOR  OF  GALLERY  OF  THE  BRITISH  ARTISTS 
SHOWING  VELARIUM  AND  ARRANGEMENT  OF  PICTURES 


PEN-AND-INK 
Formerly  in  the  possession  of  G.  R.  Halkett 


(See  page  305} 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

one  thing  or  another  and  declared  his  intention  of  resigning.  You 
had  better  make  a  note  of  it,  Mr..  Secretary,  I  said.  And  then  I 
got  up  with  great  solemnity  and  I  announced  the  honour  conferred 
upon  them  by  Her  Gracious  Majesty.  They  jumped  up  and  rushed 
towards  me  with  outstretched  hands.  But  I  waved  them  all  back, 
and  continued  with  the  ceremonial  to  which  they  objected.  For 
the  ceremonial  was  one  of  their  grievances.  They  were  accustomed 
to  meet  in  shirt-sleeves,  free-and-easy  fashion,  which  I  would  not 
stand.  Nor  would  I  consent  to  what  was  the  rule  and  tradition 
of  the  Society.  I  would  not,  when  I  spoke,  step  down  from  the 
chair  and  stand  up  in  the  body  of  the  meeting,  but  remained  always 
where  I  was.  But,  the  meeting  over,  I  sent  for  champagne.  Alto 
gether  when  it  came  to  the  time  of  re-electing  the  President,  usually 
as  mere  a  form  as  at  the  Academy,  they  took  advantage  of  it  to 
get  rid  of  me.  Now,  at  last!  I  told  them,  you  must  be  satisfied. 
You  can  no  longer  say  you  have  the  right  man  in  the  wrong  place. " 
Then  wild  talk  of  Burns,  Elwell  falling  of  a  sudden  upon  Blaikie 
for  Scotland's  ill  treatment  of  Burns  during  his  lifetime,  though 
Blaikie  had  said  earlier  in  the  evening  that  he  might  abuse  things 
Scotch  sometimes  himself,  but  he  could  never  allow  anyone  else 
to  do  it.  Whistler,  who  tried  to  smooth  things  down  for  everybody, 
said,  "after  all,  Burns  was  not  Scotch:  in  the  turning  around  of  the 
world,  he,  the  Genius,  just  happened  to  be  born  there."  Then  talk 
of  the  Davenport  Brothers  and  of  spirits,  and  again  he  described 
their  seances,  and  the  inexplicable  things  that  were  done,  which, 
of  course,  were  merely  travestied  in  the  later  performances  of 
Maskelyne  and  Cook  and  people  of  that  kind.  But  one  other  thing 
about  Burns.  "The  difference  between  the  Scotch  people's  treat 
ment  of  Burns  and  of  Crockett,  is  that  they  slighted  Burns  during 
his  lifetime  and  have  been  busy  raising  monuments  ever  since; 
but  they  read  Crockett  during  his  lifetime  and  will  never  raise  a 
single  monument  to  him  after  his  death."  And  more  talk  and  talk 
until  one  o'clock  in  the  morning — Blaikie  lingered — it  was  not 
often,  he  said,  you  heard  such  brilliant  conversation. 

Blaikie  is  Walter  B.  Blaikie,  the  head  of  Constables,  the  Edinburgh 
printers,  and  the  friend  of  Henley,  Stevenson,  and  all  of  us.  Curi- 
1900]  177 

12 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

ously  enough,  whether  or  no  something  in  the  evening  rankled 
afterwards  in  memory,  that  was  the  last  time  we  ever  saw  Blaikie. 
Two  absurd  incidents  in  connection  with  the  Carlyle  portrait  we 
take  from  later  pages  of  The  Journal,  the  first  in  a  note  dated 

May  4th,  1909.  William  De  Morgan  told  Kerr-Lawson  that,  in 
Chelsea  in  the  old  days,  they  looked  upon  the  portrait  as  a  joke. 
He  knew  Carlyle,  often  walked  with  him  in  Chelsea;  he  was  a  lean, 
spare  man  with  thin,  clean-shaven  face,  not  at  all  like  Whistler's 
Carlyle.  Lawson  reminded  him  of  Boehm's  statue  in  the  Chelsea 
Embankment  Gardens,  which  he  surely  passed  almost  daily  while 
in  London :  the  face  in  the  statue  is  the  same  as  the  face  in  Whistler's 
painting.  De  Morgan  was  astonished — he  had  never  noticed  it! 
But  what  was  De  Morgan  save  a  pompous  old  bore,  who  wrote 
tiresome  books  that  delight  the  middle  classes.  He  described 
English  life,  and  his  power  of  observation  was  so  small  that  he 
did  not  know  what  the  man  whose  acquaintance  he  claimed  looked 
like,  and  could  not  see  a  life-size  statue  directly  in  front  of  him. 

The  other  incident  comes  from  Mr.  F.  Ernest  Jackson: — • 
Friday,  February  i^th,  1908.  Some  few  years  ago,  just  back  from 
studying  in  Paris,  with  less  than  he  liked  to  do,  he  spent  a  good 
deal  of  time  wandering  about  London.  One  late  summer  afternoon 
he  was  sitting  on  a  bench  in  Hyde  Park  near  the  Marble  Arch, 
watching  the  people  pass,  4nd  an  old  man,  not  unlike  Carlyle, 
came  and  sat  on  the  same  bench.  Many  bicycles  were  passing 
along  Park  Lane,  and  the  old  man  made  some  opening  remark 
about  the  wonderful  inventions  of  the  age,  and  Jackson  answered 
something  about  the  beauty  that  counted  for  more  and  was  sacri 
ficed  to  them.  The  old  man  asked  him  if  he  was  an  artist  and  he 
said  he  was.  Then  the  old  man  spoke  of  Whistler,  who  had  been 
his  neighbour  in  Wellington  Square  (where  to  our  knowledge 
Whistler  never  lived),  and  there  the  Carlyle  was  painted  and  there 
he  sat  for  it  sometimes.  Then  he  went  on  to  say  that  the  Carlyle 
was  not  painted  by  Whistler,  but  by  somebody  else  and  there  had 
been  a  bet  that,  if  shown  as  a  Whistler,  nobody  would  know  the  dif 
ference,  which  was  what  happened  and  the  truth  has  not  been  told 
178  [1900 


r  „ 


JL'UV.   OR    THE   LONDON    SERIO-COMf      JOl'KV.M 


PAGE  OF  SKETCHES  OF  BRITISH  ARTISTS  EXHIBITION,   1886 

PEN-AND-INK 

By  Bernard  Partridge.     Judy,  showing  Portraits  of  Lady  Colin  Campbell,  destroyed,   top  left, 
and  Mrs.  Whistler,  top  right 

(See  page  176) 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

to  this  day.  An  extraordinary  story,  though  we  can  see  how  it  grew 
out  of  old  Greaves  sitting  for  Carlyle's  coat  and  the  two  Greaves 
helping  Whistler  in  the  studio.  One  can  see  too  how  the  history 
made  to-day  prepares  the  way  for  the  attributions  of  to-morrow. 

Whistler  was  right  about  Crockett.  He  is  already  forgotten,  as 
are  all  the  others  of  the  once  popular  Kail-Yard.  Ian  Maclaren 
has  gone.  Barrie  will  go.  Whistler's  Crockett  is  one  of  the  por 
traits  that  have  vanished,  though  Whistler  was  pleased  with  it. 
When  he  asked  E.  to  the  studio  to  see  it,  he  said  that  Crockett  was 
delighted  with  it  and  he  rather  liked  it  himself. 

Friday,  August  loth,  1900.  An  early  visit  from  Whistler,  with  time 
tables.  He  thinks  of  going  to  Middleburg  with  Elwell,  he  thinks 
of  going  to  Ireland.  He  may  start  for  either  place,  but  cannot 
decide.  "Well,  you  know,  I  wish  there  was  some  one  just  to  take 
hold  of  me  and  tell  me  what  to  do  and  get  me  ready  to  do  it." 

Friday,  August  ijth.  Again  quite  an  early  visit  from  Whistler;  the 
announcement  of  his  return  from  Holland,  where  he  found  Dom- 
burg  a  wonderful  little  place,  just  beginning  to  be  known  but  not 
yet  exploited,  and  he  recommends  a  visit  before  it  is  ruined.  He 
feels  all  the  better  for  it,  he  says,  and  he  looks  it.  And  there  was 
a  merchant  from  Dordrecht,  "a  little  reserved  at  first  at  the  table 
d'hote,  but  finally  finding  he  was  in  safe  company  with  me,  he 
explained  that  I  need  have  no  fear  about  the  Boers;  the  Dutch  are 
financing  them." 

In  the  evening,  as  he  promised,  Whistler  came  to  dinner,  but  he 
was  unmistakably  drowsy  as  the  result  of  travelling  the  night 
before,  and  after  dinner,  he  went  fast  asleep,  not  even  waking 
when  Lavery  came  in  later. 

Six  summers  afterwards,  E.  happening  to  be  in  Middleburg, in  mem 
ory  of  Whistler  went  one  afternoon  to  Domburg.  It  seemed  still 
unspoiled — two  or  three  long  streets  lined  with  trees  meeting  over 
head,  low  red-roofed  cottages,  a  small  group  of  hotels,  high  dunes  pro 
tecting  the  village.  The  sky  forever  cloud  swept,  the  red  roofs  above 
the  green,  the  lines  of  the  dunes  are  in  Whistler's  water-colours.  But 
how,  she  wondered,  did  he  manage  about  the  five  o'clock  dinner? 
1900]  179 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Friday,  September  jth.  Back  from  Paris,  and  Whistler,  too,  back 
from  Ireland.  Came  and  dined,  and  the  Sauters.  Ireland  evidently 
was  not  a  great  success — the  house  was  on  the  wrong  side  of  the 
Bay,  the  weather  wasn't  what  it  should  be,  and  it  was  clear  there 
was  not,  as  in  the  case  of  Domburg,  reason  for  enthusiasm.  But 
Chester,  on  the  way  home,  was  charming — full  of  possibilities. 
The  talk  was  altogether  and  entirely  of  the  Boers — except  once 
when  he  told  us  how,  walking  down  Bond  Street  on  the  arm  of 
little  Brown,  he  saw  Menpes.  Brown  was  confused  but  Whistler 
was  delighted  and  turned  round  for  another  look — "He's  back 
from  the  front,  then!"  Whistler  said  to  Brown. 

Though  he  was  on  the  wrong  side  of  the  Bay,  he  managed  to  do  a 
few  charming  things  in  Ireland.  One  or  two  later  went  into  Can- 
field's  collection. 

Saturday,  September  i$th.  To-day  Joseph  home  from  Switzerland, 
and  I  from  Dorsetshire,  find  that  Whistler  called  last  evening  and 
wanted  to  see  J.  urgently.  J.  went  up  to  the  studio  to  breakfast. 
Little  Brown  was  there,  and  nothing  seemed  particularly  urgent. 
Whistler  came  to  dinner.  His  mood  was  retrospective.  Talk,  of 
course,  began  with  the  Boers.  Kruger's  flight,  or  removal  to 
Laurence  Marquez  led  to  comparisons  with  Jefferson  Davis,  and 
talk  of  Jefferson  Davis  reminded  Whistler  that  it  was  through  him 
he  got  his  appointment  to  the  Coast  Survey.  "It  was  after  my 
little  difference  of  opinion  with  the  Professor  of  Chemistry  at 
West  Point.  The  Professor  would  not  agree  with  me  that  silicon 
was  a  gas,  but  declared  it  was  a  metal,  and  as  we  could  come  to  no 
agreement  on  the  matter,  it  was  suggested — all  in  the  most  cour 
teous  and  correct  West  Point  way — that  perhaps  I  had  better  leave 
the  Academy.  Well,  you  know,  it  was  not  a  moment  for  the  return 
of  the  prodigal  to  his  family  or  any  slaying  of  fatted  calves.  I  had 
to  work  and  I  went  to  Washington  and  called  at  once  on  Jefferson 
Davis,  who  was  the  Secretary  of  War,  a  West  Point  man  like 
myself.  He  was  most  charming,  and  I — well — from  my  Russian 
cradle,  I  had  an  idea  of  things  and  the  interview  was  in  every  way 
correct,  conducted  on  both  sides  with  the  utmost  dignity  and 
180  [1900 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

elegance.  I  explained  my  unfortunate  difference  with  the  Professor 
of  Chemistry,  represented  that  the  question  was  one  of  no  vital 
importance,  while  on  all  really  important  questions,  I  had  carried 
off  more  than  the  necessary  marks.  My  explanation  made,  I 
suggested  that  I  should  be  reinstated  at  West  Point,  in  which  case, 
as  far  as  I  was  concerned,  silicon  should  remain  a  metal.  The 
Secretary,  courteous  to  the  end,  promised  to  consider  the  matter, 
and  named  a  day  for  a  second  interview.  Before  I  went  back  to 
the  Secretary,  I  called  on  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  also  a  South 
erner,  James  C.  Dobbin  of  South  Carolina,  suggesting  that  I  should 
have  an  appointment  in  the  Navy.  The  Secretary  objected  that 
I  was  too  old.  In  the  confidence  of  youth,  I  suggested  that  age 
should  be  no  objection.  I  could  be  entered  at  the  Naval  Academy 
and  the  three  years  at  West  Point  could  count  at  Annapolis.  The 
Secretary  was  interested  for  he  too  had  a  sense  of  things.  He 
regretted,  with  gravity,  the  impossibility.  But  something  im 
pressed  him,  for  later  he  reserved  one  of  six  appointments  he  had 
to  make  in  the  Marines,  and  offered  it  to  me.  In  the  meantime  I 
had  returned  to  the  Secretary  of  War  who  had  decided  that  my 
wishes  in  the  matter  of  West  Point  could  not  be  met.  West  Point 
discipline  had  to  be  observed,  and  if  one  cadet  were  reinstated,  a 
dozen  others  who  had  tumbled  out  after  me,  would  have  to  be 
reinstated  too.  But  if  I  would  call  on  Captain  Benham  of  the 
Coast  Survey,  a  post  might  be  waiting  for  me  there.  And  so  it 
was;  Captain  Benham  had  been  my  father's  friend,  and  under  him 
I  became  an  official  in  the  Coast  Survey.  I  worked — yes — but 
with  no  great  enthusiasm:  I  was  apt  to  be  late,  I  was  so  busy 
socially.  I  lived  in  a  small  room,  but  it  was  amazing  how  I  was 
asked  and  went  everywhere,  to  balls,  to  the  Legations,  to  all  that 
was  going  on.  Labouchere,  an  Attache  at  the  British  Embassy, 
has  never  ceased  to  talk  of  me,  so  gay,  and  when  I  had  not  a  dress 
suit,  pinning  up  the  tails  of  my  ordinary  coat  and  turning  it  into 
a  dress  coat  for  the  occasion.  Shocking! 

"But  all  the  while,  indeed  ever  since  my  Russian  cradle,  there 
had  always  been  the  thought  of  art,  and  when,  at  last,  I  told  the 
family  that  I  was  going  to  Paris,  they  said  nothing.  There  was 
1900]  181 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

no  difficulty;  they  just  got  me  a  ticket.  I  was  to  have  three  hun 
dred  and  fifty  dollars  a  year,  which  my  halj:  brother  George,  who 
was  one  of  my  guardians,  sent  to  me  after  that  every  quarter,  and 
so  in  Paris  I  was  quite  a  swell — that  is  in  the  Quarter,  of  course. 
It  was  before  this,  when  the  Doctor  and  I  were  boys  in  Russia, 
that  my  sister  [half-sister]  married  Seymour  Haden.  They  had 
met  when  my  sister  was  staying  with  an  aunt,  one  of  the  McNeills, 
Eliza  McNeill,  who  married  for  her  second  husband  Winstanley  in 
Stanley.  I  remember  that  my  father  came  to  England  specially 
to  see  Seymour  Haden,  and  I  was  with  him,  and,  from  the  first, 
disliked  him.  Haden  patted  me  on  the  shoulder  and  said  it  was 
high  time  the  boy  was  going  to  school.  Nor  do  I  think  my  father 
approved.  My  mother  came  over  and  joined  me  towards  the  end 
of  the  war.  She  had  been  with  the  Doctor  during  the  war,  and  she 
ran  the  blockade,  to  get  to  England." 

The  evening  ended  with  a  violent  discussion  about  Labouchere, 
whom  Whistler,  liking,  makes  fit  in  to  his  standard  and  theory 
of  conduct  in  every  way.  "  People  misjudge  him  about  his  political 
work,  you  know,  as,  for  long,  they  misjudged  me  about  my  paint 
ing.  When  I  gave  my  Venice  show  at  the  Fine  Art  Society's,  I 
went  there  one  day  and  met  Sir  George  and  Lady  Beaumont  face 
to  face  at  the  door  as  they  were  coming  out.  Both  looked  very 
much  bored,  but  they  couldn't  escape  me.  So — well — the  old  man 
grasped  my  hand  and  chuckled — We  have  just  been  looking  at 
your  things,  and  have  been  so  much  amused!  He  had  an  idea 
that  the  drawings  on  the  walls  were  drolleries  of  some  sort,  though 
he  could  not  understand  why,  and  that  it  was  his  duty  to  be 
amused.  And  I  laughed  with  him.  I  always  did  with  people  of 
that  kind,  so  they  said  I  was  not  serious,  and  that  is  very  much 
the  world's  attitude  with  Labouchere." 

The  story  of  Whistler's  meeting  with  Captain  Benham  years  after 
in  Paris  is  in  the  Life.  There  was  another  occasion  he  must  have 
told  us  about  before  we  began  our  Journal,  when  he  took  the  Rus 
sian  Ambassador  home  with  him,  marketing  on  the  way,  doing 
the  cooking  himself,  and  serving  the  Ambassador  the  best  dinner 
he  ever  ate. 
182  [1900 


UNDER  A  BRIDGE 
PASTEL 


m 


THE  RIVA 

BLACK  CHALK 

Commencement  of  pastel 
In  the  possession  of  Mitchell  Kennerley,  Esq. 


VENICE  PASTELS 
In  the  possession  of  J.  P.  Heseltine,  Esq. 


THE  GOLD  GIRL.  CONNIE  GILCHRIST,  SKETCHES  OF  THE  PICTURE 

PEN-AND-INK 

In  the  possession  of  Alan  S.  Cole.  C.  B.,  and  Henry  Blackburne 


THE  DANCING  GIRL 

PEN-AND-INK 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

Whistler,  for  many  years,  gave  undue  importance  to  two  men  who 
did  him  great  harm,  though  they  gave  him  great  publicity.  One 
was  Edmund  Yates,  the  other  was  Henry  Labouchere.  Edmund 
Yates  was  supposed  to  be  a  wit  and  he  owned  and  edited  The 
World.  Labouchere  had  the  same  reputation,  and  he  owned  and 
edited  Truth.  They  were  rivals  and  pretended  enemies.  Whistler 
saw  a  great  deal  of  them  at  the  Beefsteak  Club.  Edmund  Yates 
published  in  his  paper  many  of  the  most  brilliant  letters  in  The 
Gentle  Art.  These  would  be  commented  on  in  The  World  by  Yates, 
who  called  himself  "Atlas,"  and  then  contradicted  by  Henry 
Labouchere  in  Truth.  This  game  of  battledore — though  not 
Whistler's  letters — was  badinage  but  the  readers  of  the  two  papers, 
who  were  society  people,  politicians,  sports  and  city  gents,  ^took 
the  papers  and  their  contents  deadly  seriously;  that  is,  they  took 
everything  seriously  except  Whistler  who  was  serious.  They 
regarded  him  as  a  joke.  However,  he  found  the  papers  useful, 
for  they  gave  him  the  only  publicity  he  could  get  at  that  time. 
Both  Yates  and  Labouchere  understood  Whistler,  and  their  papers 
were  really  clever,  the  contents  vastly  different  from  the  drivel 
and  blackguardism  which  disgrace  the  American  society  news 
paper  columns. 

Both  men  also  were  collectors.  Labouchere  owned  till  his  death 
the  portrait  of  Connie  Gilchrist  Skipping — The  Gold  Girl — which 
is  now,  or  what  is  left  of  it,  in  the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  New 
York.  The  year  after  Whistler's  death,  Labouchere  sold  the  paint 
ing  and  it  was  handed  over  to  the  care  of  Robert  Ross,  then  running 
the  Carfax  Gallery.  He  showed  it  to  E.  in  his  house  in  Sheffield 
Gardens,  where  it  hung  for  a  while,  and  told  her  that  Labouchere 
let  Whistler  have  it  back  to  work  on  it.  Whistler  had  not  touched 
the  canvas.  The  truth  is,  he  was  always  trying  to  get  the  picture 
back  to  destroy  it,  not  to  work  on  it.  It  was  in  the  studio  when 
he  died  and  the  executrix,  Robert  Ross  added,  was  obliged  to  give 
it  up,  though  reluctantly.  In  the  poor  light  of  an  upper  room 
E.  could  not  see  it  well,  but,  as  well  as  she  could  see,  the  painting 
seemed  flat  and  dead,  and  the  regret  is  that  Whistler  left  it  in  that 
condition.  The  picture  was  a  failure,  and  Whistler  knew  it.  For 
long,  down  the  back  of  the  figure,  there  ran  a  great  black  line  of 
paint  that  showed  the  whole  thing  was  to  have  been  drawn  again. 
Eventually  it  came  into  the  possession  of  Mr.  Hearn  who  carefully 
had  the  black  line  removed,  and  to-day,  cleaned  and  smugged  up, 
the  Connie  Gilchrist  reposes  in  the  Metropolitan,  the  butt  of 
American  critics  who  do  not  know  enough  to  say  nothing.  The 
Metropolitan  Museum  is  unfortunate  in  having  some  of  the  most 

1900]  183 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

unimportant  and  least  desirable  Whistlers  of  any  collection  in  the 
world,  when  it  might  have  had  the  best — the  Mother,  The  White 
Girl,  and  a  number  of  others.  As  it  is,  the  Henry  Irving  is  the  one 
distinguished  Whistler  there.  Truth  and  The  World  also  printed 
so-called  caricatures,  mostly  artless.  In  them  Whistler  appeared 
over  and  over,  and  they  look  as  if  they  had  been  the  foundation 
of  more  than  one  of  the  Greaves'  portraits.  One  of  Spy's  may  now 
be  seen  in  the  National  Portrait  Gallery,  London.  Through  these 
caricatures  Whistler  became  widely  known  to  the  British  public, 
and  it  is  thanks  to  The  World  and  Truth  and  their  illustrations  that 
he  came  to  be  accepted  as  a  joke.  The  shock  to  the  British  public 
was  when  it  suddenly  awoke  to  find  he  was  a  great  artist  and  a 
great  man — the  American  public  has  not  found  it  out  yet.  Nor 
did  that  part  of  the  British  public  of  which  Lord  and  Lady  Beau 
mont  were  types  ever  wake  up.  More  than  five  years  after 
Whistler's  death,  a  month  or  so  after  the  Life  was  published,  at 
some  afternoon  reception,  E.  met  Lady  Dorothy  Nevill  who  said 
she  had  read  the  book  with  the  greatest  interest  because  her 
friendship  with  Whistler  dated  so  far  back.  She  gushed  to  E. 
She  had  known  Whistler,  had  gone  to  his  breakfasts.  He  was  a 
delightful  creature,  so  amusing,  he  would  show  you  a  pair  of  boots 
on  a  canvas  and  you  were  expected  to  see  in  them  a  full-length 
life-size  figure!  And  her  laugh  might  have  been  the  re-echo  of  Lord 
Beaumont's  chuckle. 

Those  who  did  not  laugh  were  afraid.  An  instance  is  in  a  delightful 
story  little  Brown  told  E.  of  Mr.  Burrell  who  bought  The  Fur 
Jacket  and  other  Whistlers,  and  has  long  since  parted  with  them. 

February  loth,  1909.  He  was  most  anxious  to  meet  Whistler,  little 
Brown  said  he  would  arrange  it,  and  Whistler  invited  them  both 
to  tea  in  the  studio.  On  their  way,  in  the  hansom,  Burrell,  a  great 
big  Scotchman,  a  champion  football  player  or  something  of  that 
sort,  sat  very  still  at  first,  then,  squaring  his  shoulders,  said  with 
a  great  air  of  determination,  "No  matter  what  he  says  or  does, 
I  will  not  retaliate!"  Brown's  comment  was  that  his  idea  of 
Whistler  was  most  people's  idea  of  J.,  a  man  with  one  hand  holding 
a  pen  ready  to  write  disagreeable  things,  the  other  thrust  in  his 
pocket  to  draw  his  revolver. 

To  those  who  did  not  laugh,  or  arm  for  a  fight,  he  was  simply  a 
mountebank.  We  were  told  by  some  one  who  heard  it  that  after 
184  [1900 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

his  death  he  was  called  a  "Charlatan"  by  the  Princess  Louise,  the 
one  member  of  the  Royal  Family  credited  with  an  intelligent  inter 
est  in  art.  If  this  was  her  feeling,  we  wonder  why  the  Whistler 
bust  by  Boehm  remained  so  long  in  her  possession.  However,  she 
succeeded  in  getting  rid  of  it  during  the  war  at  the  big  war  charity 
sale  held  at  Christie's  in  April,  1915. 

Sunday,  September  i6th,  1900.  Whistler  dined  and  Agnes  Repplier 
— not  a  successful  combination.  The  dinner  dragged  until  E.  J. 
Sullivan  happened  to  come  in,  and  Whistler  woke  up,  and,  all  of 
a  sudden,  I  hardly  know  how,  he  was  plunged  into  the  midst  of 
the  Lake  Country  and  a  Church  Congress,  travelling  third  class 
with  the  clergy  and  their  families,  eating  jam  and  strange  meals 
with  quantities  of  tea,  and  visiting  the  Rev.  Mr.  Green  in  his 
prison,  shut  up  by  his  Bishop  for  burning  candles  and  altogether 
the  hero  and  important  person  he  would  never  be  on  coming  out. 
An  amazing  story,  but  what  Whistler  was  doing  in  the  Lakes, 
which  had  nothing  about  them  but  little  round  mountains  with 
little  round  trees  on  top,  and  what  he  was  doing  with  the  clergy, 
he  did  not  appear  to  know — the  story  was  enough.  Also,  out  of 
the  talk  of  the  evening,  I  have  the  memory  of  Whistler's  pictur 
esque  description  of  the  monastery  adjoining  his  garden  in  the 
Rue  du  Bac;  the  music  of  the  monks'  hymns,  and  the  mystery  of  it, 
heard  in  the  twilight  of  summer  evenings,  and  the  glimpse  of  solemn 
processions  through  their  garden  on  winter  mornings — the  beauty 
of  ritual,  he  declared,  is  all  with  the  Catholics.  But  the  evening, 
on  the  whole,  not  one  of  our  most  successful. 

If  we  remember,  this  was  one  of  Whistler's  very  sleepy  evenings. 
No  doubt  there  had  been  a  more  than  usually  hard  day's  work  in 
the  studio.  On  another  evening,  he  probably  would  have  responded 
to  Miss  Repplier  as  joyfully  as  to  Mrs.  Whitman.  As  it  was,  his 
story  of  the  Lakes  and  the  clergy  was  as  funny  as  it  could  be, 
though,  as  Miss  Repplier  said  afterwards,  enchantingly  funny  and 
witty  as  it  seemed  to  her  when  he  told  it,  when  she  tried  to  tell  it 
herself  afterwards,  she  could  not  succeed  in  even  suggesting  the 
fun  or  the  wit,  and  her  friends  could  not  understand  why  she  had 
laughed.  It  was  not  only  the  story  with  Whistler,  but  the  amazing 
way  he  told  it. 
1900]  185 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

The  monastery  next  door  at  the  Rue  du  Bac  was  one  of  missionary 
monks  who  are  sent  out  to  the  French  Colonies.  They  are  the 
bearded  priests  one  sometimes  sees  in  Paris.  Every  afternoon  in 
summer  at  the  hour  of  the  Angelus,  or  in  the  month  of  May  for 
the  May  devotions  of  the  Blessed  Virgin,  they  gathered  under  the 
great  trees  which  towered  over  the  wall  dividing  the  gardens  of 
the  two  houses,  and  there  sang  their  hymns.  It  was  beautiful 
and  impressive  and,  no  matter  who  was  with  Whistler  in  his  garden 
or  what  was  the  talk,  every  one  became  silent  and  listened. 
Whistler  loved  it,  felt  the  beauty  of  it,  and  so  did  we  all. 

Monday,  September  ijth.  Coming  home  about  ten,  we  found 
Whistler  waiting,  established  with  The  Star.  Partly  a  Boer  evening, 
Brown  of  the  Fine  Art  Society — little  Brown — had  lunched  with 
us  and  told  us  stories  which  Whistler  confirmed.  Brown  began 
life  in  the  Seeleys'  office.  It  was  in  the  days  of  The  Portfolio,  and 
he  was  sent  to  see  Whistler  on  some  matter  relating  to  the  Billings 
gate  plate,  which  Whistler  sold  to  The  Portfolio.  He  had  no  idea 
he  was  to  see  a  man  in  any  way  extraordinary,  and  he  can  remember 
now  the  vivid  impression  Whistler's  manner  and  appearance  made 
on  him.  It  was  in  the  White  House.  Whistler  took  him  to  the 
window  and  showed  him  the  river  and  the  view  of  Battersea 
beyond.  Then  he  put  his  hand  on  Brown's  shoulder  and  said, 
"I  am  afraid  I  am  going  to  lose  my  house!"  This  was  not  long 
before  the  sale.  In  the  meanwhile  Brown  drifted  to  the  Fine  Art 
Society's,  carrying  with  him  the  deep  impression  made  by  Whistler 
and  his  work.  The  result  was,  the  Society  bought  two  London 
plates.  Then  the  crash  came.  Whistler  wanted  to  go  to  Venice, 
and  they  arranged  with  him  for  a  series  of  twelve  plates,  to  be 
done  in  three  months,  and  they  advanced  part  of  the  money. 
Whistler  went  away,  time  passed,  no  plates  came,  but  demands  for 
more  money.  They  were  used  to  artists  who  if  they  said  three 
months,  kept  to  it,  and  they  began  to  have  their  doubts,  while  he, 
naturally,  was  furious  at  their  suggestion  of  doubt.  This,  Brown 
says,  was  the  cause  of  the  trouble.  Indignant  letters  passed,  a 
wonderful  correspondence,  and  all  the  time  Whistler,  who  had  no 
resentment  against  Brown,  whose  fault  it  was  not,  was  writing 
186  [1900 


WHISTLER'S  AMERICA  OF  EARLY  DAYS 

him  friendly  letters  which  he  still  has.  Fifteen  months  was  the 
length  of  time  Whistler  stayed  in  Venice.  But  when  he  did  come 
back,  the  etchings  were  a  great  success.  Next  came  the  pastel 
show.  Nothing  of  the  kind  had  been  done  before,  the  public  knew 
nothing  of  pastels,  but  they  made  eighteen  hundred  pounds  out 
of  the  show.  This  Brown  quoted  to  prove  that  Wliistler  had 
never  been  neglected,  in  one  sense  of  the  word  anyway.  They 
wanted  him  to  go  on,  to  follow  up  the  first  with  another  exhibition 
of  the  kind.  But  he  wouldn't.  He  would  have  made  a  fortune, 
if  he  had,  according  to  Brown. 

Whistler  added  to  this  a  description  of  his  first  appearance  at  the 
Fine  Art  Society's  after  his  return.  "Well,  you  know,  I  was  just 
home,  nobody  had  seen  me  and  I  drove  up  in  a  hansom.  Nobody 
expected  me.  In  one  hand  I  held  my  long  cane;  with  the  other, 
I  led  by  a  ribbon  a  beautiful  little  white  Pomeranian  dog — it  too 
had  turned  up  quite  suddenly.  As  I  walked  in,  I  spoke  to  no  one, 
but  putting  up  my  glass  I  looked  at  the  prints  on  the  walls:  Dear 
me!  Dear  me  I  I  said.  Still  the  same  old  sad  work!  Dear  me! 
And  Haden  was  there  talking  hard  to  Brown  and  laying  down  the 
law,  and  as  he  said  Rembrandt,  I  said  Ha!  ha!  and  he  vanished. 
And  then,  when  I  was  hanging  my  etchings,  the  consternation  was 
great.  On  the  ladder,  I  could  hear  whispers  below  me — no  one 
would  be  able  to  see  the  etchings.  Of  course,  I  said,  that's  all 
right.  In  an  exhibition  of  etchings,  the  etchings  are  the  last  things 
people  come  to  see.  The  pastel  show  was  a  source  of  constant 
consternation  on  their  part,  and  amusement  on  mine.  There  was 
the  private  view,  when  I  had  my  box  of  wonderful  little  Butterflies, 
which  I  gave  only  to  the  select  few,  and,  naturally,  everybody  was 
eager  to  be  decorated.  And  when  the  crowd  was  greatest,  Royalty 
appeared,  quite  unprecedented,  you  know,  at  a  private  view,  and 
the  crowd  was  hustled  into  another  room,  and  the  Prince  and 
Princess  went  round  the  gallery  looking  at  everything,  the  Prince 
roaring  over  the  catalogue.  I  am  afraid  you  are  very  malicious, 
Mr.  Whistler,  the  Princess  said.  There  were,  well,  you  know, 
differences  too  about  money.  The  Society  would  pay  nothing  in 
advance.  It  was  against  their  rules  to  pay  until  the  end  of  the 
1900]  187 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

show.  So  the  next  Saturday  afternoon,  I  came  just  when  the 
crowd  was  thickest,  and  everything  was  going  beautifully,  Huish 
and  Brown  taking  people  round  and  showing  them  and  explaining 
the  pastels,  on  the  point  of  selling  many,  and  I  stood  in  the  little 
central  gallery,  and  I  said  in  a  loud  gay  voice,  Well,  the  Show's 
over.  Huish  and  Brown  rushed  up  and  tried  to  quiet  me.  Every 
body  was  in  a  fearful  agitation.  But  I  said  again,  The  Show's 
over:  Ha!  ha!  they  will  not  give  me  any  money  and  the  Show's 
over.  Finally,  Huish  promised  to  give  me  a  cheque  on  Monday — 
I  had  first  asked  for  two  hundred  pounds;  now  I  made  it  three 
hundred,  and  so  I  said,  All  right,  the  Show  can  go  on.  And  on 
Monday  I  had  my  cheque.  A  little  later  I  exhibited  the  other 
etchings  I  made  in  Venice  at  the  Dowdeswells." 

Ernest  G.  Brown  was  a  very  good  friend  to  Whistler.  "He  used 
to  say  that  he  would  lay  the  eggs,"  Brown  told  us,  "but  I  must 
supply  the  incubator.  But  he  seemed  anxious  not  to  give  up 
the  eggs — that  was  the  trouble!"  Financially,  and  it  was  only 
for  financial  reasons  that  Whistler  was  commissioned  by  the  Fine 
Art  Society,  the  first  show  of  his  etchings  for  which  the  Fine  Art 
Society  paid  him  twelve  hundred  pounds  and  some  proofs,  could 
scarcely  be  considered  a  success.  The  first  Venice  Sets  were  not 
disposed  of  for  years.  Nor  was  eighteen  hundred  pounds  for  the 
pastels  a  great  success  as  these  things  go.  The  fact  is,  he  could 
never  get  any  one  to  publish  a  set  of  any  of  his  etchings  after  the 
publication  of  the  two  Venetian  series.  There  is  a  little  confusion 
in  this  note  about  the  Catalogue  and  the  Butterflies,  which  we 
were  able  to  correct  before  the  Life  was  written.  The  Catalogue 
that  contains  the  newspaper  comments  and  the  Butterflies  dis 
tributed  to  friends  were  for  the  exhibition  of  the  Second  Series  of 
Etchings  and  Dry  Points.  This  is  the  Catalogue  in  which 
Whistler  so  neatly  exposed  Wedmore  who,  after  this,  was  careful 
not  to  commit  himself  quite  so  freely.  He  was  not  the  only  critic 
who  now  hesitated.  Whistler's  catalogues  showed  them  up  too 
unmercifully.  There  was  a  four  page  leaflet,  a  list  of  the  First 
Venice  Series,  issued  by  the  Fine  Art  Society  but  no  brown  paper 
catalogue.  The  Etchings,  however,  were  in  a  brown  paper  portfolio. 
The  Fine  Art  Society  held  probably  one  or  more  other  exhibitions 
of  Whistler's  water-colours  and  pastels,  but  most  of  his  exhibitions 
in  these  years  were  at  Dowdeswells'.  At  any  rate  they  had  a  number 
188  [1900 


m 


THE  QUADRI  AT  VENICE,  WHISTLER'S  CAFE 

PASTEL 

By  Joseph  Pennell 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


SKETCH  OF 
WHISTLER 

PEN-AND-INK 

By  Phil  May 


HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

of  water-colours  and  pastels  in  their  possession  which  they  event 
ually  sold  at  Sotheby's.  J.  remembers  going  to  the  sale  where  they 
brought  a  mere  nothing. 

The  Fine  Art  Society,  however,  arranged  the  first  exhibition  of 
his  lithographs  in  London,  in  December,  1895.  For  this,  Whistler 
asked  J.  to  write  the  Introduction  to  the  Catalogue,  the  only  time 
he  ever  asked  any  one  to  do  so.  The  exhibition  was  far  from  a 
financial  success,  and  no  one  save  a  few  artists  paid  the  least 
attention  to  it.  The  prices  were  mostly  two  and  three  guineas. 
But  at  the  sale  of  the  Jessop  Collection  at  the  New  York  Anderson 
Galleries  in  November,  1919,  for  which  also  J.  wrote  an  Introduc 
tion  to  the  Catalogue  one  of  these  lithographs  brought  the  sum  of 
thirty-six  hundred  dollars  and  the  total  sales  were  about  forty 
thousand,  and  the  whole  affair  was  thought  of  enough  artistic 
importance  to  fill  columns  in  the  American  papers  and  to  be  cabled 
to  Europe.  Yet  these  were  the  lithographs  nobody  wanted  twenty- 
five  years  before. 

The  little  white  Pomeranian  is  the  only  dog  we  know  of  that  figured 
publicly  in  Whistler's  life.  It  went  with  the  long  stick  and  the 
cape  of  the  overcoat,  and  all  the  gay  extravagances  of  the 
Eighties,  when  it  was  conspicuous  for  a  time.  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler 
said  that  he  took  it  everywhere,  to  the  theatre,  in  cabs,  wherever 
he  went.  Once  he  left  it  for  an  evening  by  itself  in  the  Air  Street 
rooms,  and  when  he  came  back  it  had  eaten  up  a  pair  of  his  trousers, 
and  that  probably  was  the  end,  for  he  whipped  it  and  called  it  a 
bad  dog,  and  it  disappeared  as  mysteriously  as  it  appeared  and 
was  never  replaced. 


CHAPTER  XII:  FAILING  HEALTH  AND  HIS  WANDER 
INGS.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  CONTINUED 

Tuesday,  September  i8th,  1900.  Whistler  dined,  to  say  goodbye  to 
J.  on  the  point  of  starting  for  the  Lakes.  A  Boer  evening  for  he 
had  come  with  a  large  supply  of  the  evening  papers.  J.  went  back 
with  him  to  the  Hotel,  and  to  the  room  of  the  Misses  Hensman, 
the  Managers,  and  drank  whiskey  and  soda,  and  Whistler  talked 
"Boer"  until  he  made  them  white  with  rage,  and  then  put  them 
into  a  good  humour  by  saying  that,  really,  they  ought  to  have  been 
Boers  themselves.  And  the  end  of  it  was  that  they  brought  out 
some  peaches,  and  J.  did  not  get  home  until  two  in  the  morning. 
1900]  189 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Sunday,  September  23rd.  Whistler  called  in  the  morning  and  he 
asked  me  to  breakfast  at  the  studio,  but  I  couldn't  go.  He  said 
he  was  doing  some  of  the  most  wonderful  things  in  pastel,  nudes, 
they  were  really  most  marvellous,  but,  indeed,  it  was  high  time  he 
did  do  something.  More  Boer  and  Chamberlain  talk,  his  pockets 
as  usual  full  of  clippings.  They  will  make,  he  says,  an  interesting 
history  of  the  present  condition  of  things  in  England. 

Saturday,  September  2Qth.  Whistler  and  Miss  Philip  dined,  and 
I  invited  the  Greiflenhagens  to  meet  them.  First,  the  talk  was 
of  the  Paris  Exhibition,  the  correctness  and  dignity  of  the  French 
galleries,  the  naivete  of  the  English,  the  stateliness  of  the  Grand 
Palais,  the  stairway,  and  a  something  elegant  and  true  to  tradition 
about  it  all.  Then  the  talk  veered  to  the  country.  Greiffenhagen 
said  that  he  felt,  more  and  more,  as  if  he  wanted  to  live  in  the 
country.  Whistler  asked  "Why?  The  country  is  detestable.  In 
Holland,  it  is  different.  There,  I  can  see  something."  "But  there 
is  no  country  in  Holland,"  Greiffenhagen  said.  "And  that  is  just 
why  I  like  it,"  was  Whistler's  answer,  "no  great  full-blown  shape 
less  trees  as  in  England,  but  everything  neat  and  trim,  and  the 
trunks  of  the  trees  painted  white,  the  cows  wear  quilts,  and  it  is 
all  arranged,  and  charming."  Then,  some  one  said  "Chamber 
lain,"  and  the  floodgates  were  opened.  But  the  beautiful,  kindly, 
intimate  way  in  which  Whistler  said  the  most  unpleasant  things 
was  stupendous.  "Of  course,  you  know,  I  do  not  speak  as  a 
stranger.  I  belong  to  London  myself,  have  been  here  for  years, 
and  belong  to  it,  and  I  understand,  as  you  do" — he  understands, 
that  is,  that  Chamberlain  is  corrupt,  that  the  English  are  hope 
lessly  stupid,  and  many  other  things  as  pleasant.  And  in  proof 
of  their  stupidity  he  tells  of  his  dinner  at  Heinemann's,  where  he 
met  Madame  Sarah  Grand,  who  started  the  evening  by  saying 
how  delightful  it  was  to  be  back  in  England.  She  had  been  in 
France  for  five  or  six  weeks,  and  during  all  that  time  had  seen  no 
men,  until  one  day  on  the  Boulevards  she  met  two  Germans  whom 
she  could  have  embraced  in  welcome  for  they,  at  least,  were  men. 
And  in  France,  the  supposed-to-be  men  never  could  forget  that 
190  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

women  are  women — she  liked  to  meet  men  as  comrades — she  did 
not  want  them  always  to  be  remembering  her  sex.  And  Whistler's 
comment  was,  "certainly  the  Englishwoman  succeeds,  as  no  others 
can,  in  obliging  men  to  forget  her  sex."  The  other  story  was  of  a 
Lady  Something,  at  Mrs.  Curtis',  in  Venice,  one  afternoon  meeting 
an  Italian  Princess  who  had  just  married  a  distinguished  Roman 
Prince,  a  descendant  of  one  of  the  oldest  families  in  Rome.  Lady — 
complimented  the  Princess  on  her  English.  Oh,  my  grandfather 
was  English,  she  explained.  "I  am  so  glad  you're  English,"  said 
Lady .  "You  know  in  England  we  don't  think  much  of  for 
eign  Princesses."  "And  in  Italy,  we  don't  think  much  of  English 
manners,"  was  the  answer.  Mrs.  Greiffenhagen  wondered  if 
England  is'in  her  decadence;  thought  not  because  art  always 
marks  the  decadence  of  a  country  and  there  was  none  here  yet. 
And  she  appealed  to  Whistler:  didn't  he  think  that  the  develop 
ment  of  art  in  a  country  was  a  sign  of  its  decadence?  But  he 
didn't  know,  "a  good  many  countries  manage  to  go  to  the  dogs 
without  it." 

MAURICE  GREIFFENHAGEN  was  an  original  member  of  the  Council 
of  the  International.  But  he  soon  resigned.  Later  he  went  over 
to  the  Academic  ranks. 

Sunday,  September  ^oth.  Breakfasted  at  one  in  the  studio  with 
Whistler  and  Miss  Philip.  He  had  just  seen  the  reproduction  of 
The  Little  White  Girl  in  The  Art  Journal's  Paris  Exhibition,  and 
Thomson's  remark  that  it  was  for  this  he  was  given  the  Grand 
Prix.  "He  is  playing  into  the  hands  of  the  many  who  like  The 
Times  man  and  D.S.M.  are  always  passing  over  the  recent  work  for 
the  early  masterpieces,"  Whistler  said.  "All  are  masterpieces; 
there  is  no  better,  no  worse.  The  thing  has  always  gone  on  and 
grown  and  the  pictures  I  am  painting  now  are  full  of  qualities  they 
cannot  understand.  D.S.M.  cannot  even  get  his  facts  straight. 
He  spoke  of  The  Little  White  Girl  in  the  Salon  des  Refuses.  It  was 
never  there.  That  was  The  White  Girl,  and  The  Little  White  Girl 
was  painted  some  years  after."  He  showed  me  two  water-colours 
done  in  Holland — one  of  the  sea  rolling  in  to  the  low  stretch  of 
1900]  191 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

sands,  the  other  of  Domburg  nestling  among  the  dunes — and  a 
series  of  wonderful  little  pastels  of  the  nude. 

Thomson  is  David  Croal  Thomson  who,  at  that  time,  was  the 
editor  of  The  Art  Journal  and  who  was  issuing,  in  serial  parts,  a 
publication  on  the  different  art  sections  in  the  Paris  Exposition 
of  1900,  and  so  important  that  Whistler  did  not  care  to  ignore  its 
mistakes.  The  Times  man  was  T.  Humphry  Ward, — "the  plain 
person  Humphry,"  Whistler  liked  to  call  him.  As  will  be  seen, 
Whistler  felt  keenly  and  resented  what  seemed  a  deliberate  attempt 
in  England  to  deprive  him  of  the  honours  awarded  him  in  France. 
D.  S.  M.  is  D.  S.  MacColl,  then  art  critic  of  The  Saturday  Review. 
His  Scotch  nonconformist  conscience  sometimes  coloured  his  criti 
cism  in  a  manner  incomprehensible  and  annoying  to  Whistler. 
For  another  specimen  of  it,  we  forget  just  what,  earlier  the  same 
year,  Whistler  told  J.  there  could  be  no  sufficient  punishment 
except  to  put  D.  S.  M.  in  the  Infantry  that  he  might  be  marched 
into  one  of  the  Boer  traps  for  the  British  and  be  shot,  "that  we 
hear  him  and  read  him  no  more."  He  tired  of  MacColPs  cham 
pionship  of  the  New  English  Art  Club  which  he  described  once  as 
"only  a  raft." 

Thursday,  October  4th.  Whistler  came  in  late,  about  ten  in  the 
evening — for  a  few  minutes — wants  to  ask  J.  to  dinner,  if  J.  gets 
back  by  Monday.  Was  afraid  to  stay  longer,  for  he  would  certainly 
go  to  sleep.  He  laughed  at  what  he  calls  my  discretion.  "You 
never  have  anything  to  tell  me  about  people  you  see.  Well,  you 
know,  the  truth  is,  you  have  a  cupboard  full  of  skeletons  and  some 
day,  when  you  are  pulling  the  strings  of  one  to  put  it  back  carefully 
in  place,  the  whole  lot  will  come  rattling  down  about  your  ears." 
This  was  because  Gosse  and  MacColl  had  been  dining  with  me  the 
night  before.  He  had  read  MacColPs  article  in  The  Saturday,  the 
first  about  the  Paris  Exhibition,  devoted  almost  altogether  to 
Manet,  with  just  a  passing  mention  of  Whistler  and  Fantin  and 
the  others  of  the  group.  "It's  all  very  well,"  Whistler  said — 
"Manet  did  good  work,  but  he  was  always  UEcolier" 

Gosse  is  Edmund  Gosse  and  MacColl,  D.  S.  M.    Whistler  delighted 
in  gossip  and  it  was  a  disappointment  to  him  when  we  had  none  to 
regale  him  with.    He  had  ceased  to  be  discreet  himself,  he  would 
say,  and  did  not  expect  discretion  in  others. 
192  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

Sunday,  October  fth.  Whistler  called  in  the  morning  early  to  say 
"how  do  you  do"  to  J.  who  came  back  last  night.  Said  he  would 
come  to  dinner,  only  he  had  arranged  to  dine  with  Jonathan  Sturges 
at  some  little  French  restaurant.  "Might  I,  perhaps,  bring  him?" 
We  said,  yes,  of  course,  and  they  came  at  eight.  He  had  been  the 
night  before  dining  in  the  Carlton  Grill  Room.  "It  is  wonderful, 
I  can  go  nowhere  without  meeting  people  I  know.  In  the  grill 
room  was  the  manager  of  the  Savoy.  Upstairs,  in  the  hall,  a  man 
bore  down  upon  me,  My  dear  Whistler,  I  am  so  glad  to  see  you 
looking  so  well.  You  don't  remember  me  ?  Chetwynd — Sir  George 
Chetwynd.  In  the  hall  where  I  went  for  coffee,  where  the  music 
is,  at  once  General  Arthur  Collins,  Princess  Louise's  Equerry,  was 
at  my  side.  So  glad,  I'm  with  some  Americans,  you  must  join  us, 
nice  simple  Americans!  Simple!  Americans!  Ha!  ha!  I  laughed. 
But  my  dear  Whistler,  you  must  come,  and  I  spent  the  evening 
with  him.  And  here  was  this  correct  Equerry  in  the  toils,  why  and 
what  for,  I  do  not  know,  of  evidently  an  American  millionaire, 
and  so  they  are  all  being  taken  possession  of  in  the  Island!"  He 
brought  with  him  a  beautiful  Caran  D'Ache — Le  Depart  du  Mare- 
chal  Roberts — with  the  Boer  popping  up  out  of  the  box  as  the  last 
handkerchief  is  waved  and  the  boat  steams  off. 

Jonathan  Sturges  was  an  American,  a  little  dwarf,  of  whom  WThistler 
said  on  one  occasion  when  he  had  been  on  George  Vanderbilt's 
yacht:  "There  we  all  were,  you  know — Philip — Velasquez — even 
the  dwarves!"  for  Paul  Leicester  Ford  was  also  in  the  party. 
Whistler  was  keen  to  keep  on  the  right  side  of  Vanderbilt  and  other 
patrons.  J.  will  never  forget  one  evening  when  Whistler  was  in 
bed  and  said  he  could  not  possibly  get  up.  But  a  message  or  tele 
gram  from  Vanderbilt  asking  him  to  dine  brought  him  at  once  out 
of  bed,  and  he  went  off  in  a  hansom,  and  the  next  day,  when  we 
saw  him,  seemed  the  better  for  it. 

Thursday,  October  nth.  We  had  already  arranged  to  have  Mr. 
Radford,  when  Whistler  wrote  that  he  would  dine  with  us.  It  was 
a  curious  combination,  not  sympathetic,  but  appreciated  as  every 
thing  of  the  kind  must  be  by  Whistler.  He  arrived,  armed  with 
Caran  D'Ache's  last  cartoon  in  Le  Journal;  all  the  events  of  the 
1900]  193 

13 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

day,  seen  from  a  balloon.  The  result  was  talk  of  the  events  of  the 
day.  I  said  I  was  glad  the  Americans  had  the  sense,  once  they 
secured  their  Minister,  to  march  out  of  China  and  Chinese  compli 
cations.  "But  why  shouldn't  they?"  Whistler  asked.  I  suggested 
that  after  Manila  and  the  Philippines  one  wasn't  sure  of  American 
policy  any  longer.  "Oh,  but  the  Philippines,"  Whistler  said, 
"that  is  quite  different.  Just  a  watering  place!"  Dinner  dragged 
a  bit,  Radford  being  much  engrossed  with  his  own  journalistic 
performances.  After  dinner  I  was  alone  for  a  minute  with  Whistler 
in  the  other  room.  Augustine  made  a  descent  upon  us  to  ask  who 
was  the  Monsieur  who  put  us  all  to  sleep?  And  Whistler  just  had 
time  to  say  with  pleasure,  he  had  been  dining  with  a  type,  a  type 
he  had  fancied  long  since  vanished.  Of  the  rest  of  his  talk  I  heard 
little,  being  obliged  to  entertain  Radford  while  Whistler  and  J. 
talked  over  the  International. 

Mr.  Radford  was  Ernest  Radford,  a  minor  poet  and  art  critic.  He 
died  but  a  few  months  ago.  We  have  referred  to  Whistler's  liking 
for  Augustine,  upon  whose  intelligent  sympathy,  as  on  this  occa 
sion,  he  could  invariably  rely. 

Sunday,  October  i^th.  A  funny  dinner  party:  Whistler,  Lavery, 
Miss  Philip,  and  Mr.  Harper,  Professor  of  Assyrian  at  the  Chicago 
University,  whom  J.  picked  up  at  the  Whitefriars  Club  last  night. 
He  talked  to  me  half  through  dinner,  so  that  I  only  had  scraps  of 
Whistler.  The  first  thing  I  had  a  chance  to  listen  to  was  an  account 
of  the  state  of  things  in  the  studios  when,  as  a  youngster,  he  first 
came  to  London.  "Well,  you  know,  I  was  received  graciously 
by  the  painters.  Then  there  was  coldness,  and  I  could  not  under 
stand.  Artists  locked  themselves  up  in  their  studios,  opened  the 
door  only  on  the  chain;  if  they  met  each  other  on  the  street,  they 
barely  spoke.  Models  went  round  with  an  air  of  mystery.  When 
I  asked  one  where  she  had  been  posing,  she  said  to  Frith  and  Watts 
and  Tadema.  Golly,  what  a  crew!  I  said.  And  that's  just  what 
they  says  when  I  told  them  I  was  a'posing  to  you.  Then  I  found 
out  the  mystery;  it  was  the  moment  of  painting  the  Royal  Academy 
picture.  Each  man  was  afraid  his  subject  might  be  stolen.  It 
194  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

was  the  era  of  the  subject.  And,  at  last,  on  Varnishing  Day  there 
was  the  subject  in  all  its  glory — wonderful! — The  British  subject! 
Like  a  flash  the  inspiration  came — the  Inventor!  And  in  the 
Academy,  there  you  saw  him,  the  familiar  model,  the  soldier  or  the 
Italian.  And  there  he  sat,  hands  on  knees,  head  bent,  brows  knit, 
eyes  staring;  in  a  corner  angels  and  cogwheels  and  things.  Close 
to  him,  his  wife,  cold,  ragged,  the  baby  in  her  arms;  he  had  failed. 
The  story  was  told.  It  was  clear  as  day — amazing! — The  British 
subject— What?" 

Then,  one  of  his  surprises.  With  all  his  West  Point  correctness 
and  elegance,  he  now  and  then  ventures  on  the  last  story  you 
would  expect  from  him,  but  always  told,  as  he  would  say,  charm 
ingly.  "A  dandy  about  town,  in  the  days  when  I  was  at  Venice, 
went  with  a  Lord  Some  One  and  a  third  man  to  the  same  hotel. 
They  had  heard  much  of  mosquitoes  and  worse.  The  first  morning, 
the  dandy  and  the  third  man  were  bitter  in  the  account  of  the 
misery  they  suffered  during  the  night.  'But,'  said  the  Lord — 'I 
had  no  trouble,  I  saw  no  bugs.'  The  dandy  stuttered  a  little. 
'Even  b-b-b-bugs,'  he  said,  'must  draw  the  1-1-line  somewhere!' ' 
Lavery  had  a  nice  mosquito  story.  He  had  been  warned  of  the 
American  mosquito.  In  Philadelphia  he  stayed  at  a  hotel  at  the 
corner  of  Broad  and  Walnut.  -  Just  as  he  was  going  to  sleep  he 
heard  a  loud  buzzing.  He  jumped  up  in  agony.  The  ordinary 
mosquito  poisoned  him.  This,  he  thought,  meant  death.  He  pulled 
down  the  windows,  turned  on  the  gas,  looked  all  over  the  walls  as 
well  as  he  could  for  the  pattern,  found  nothing,  put  out  the  light, 
but  could  not  sleep  for  hours,  lay  there  hot  and  cold.  At  last 
after  a  short,  restless  sleep,  he  woke  with  a  start  in  the  early  morn 
ing,  to  the  same  loud,  awful  buzzing — another  mosquito?  It  was 
the  electric  car  round  the  corner.  He  had  heard  the  last  trolley  car 
at  night  and  been  wakened  by  the  first  in  the  morning.  After 
dinner  Miss  Philip  and  I  sat  together,  while  the  men  smoked,  so 
that  I  had  little  more  talk  with  Whistler. 

Chase,  dining  with  us  one  night  in  Buckingham  Street,  gave  us 
another  instance  of  Royal  Academy  methods  that  puzzled  and  at 
1900]  195 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

the  same  time  amused  Whistler.  Perhaps  Chase  published  the 
story — he  published  most  everything  he  knew  about  Whistler, 
but  it  will  bear  repetition.  He  went  one  day  with  Whistler  to  see 
George  Boughton.  The  studio  was  flooded  with  light,  no  curtains, 
no  blinds,  no  shades  of  any  kind.  Whistler's  face  screwed  up  in 
discomfort^  "What's  all  this  for?"  /'Why,"  said  Boughton, 
"when  I  paint  an  outdoor  picture  in  brilliant  sunshine,  I  want  to 
have  all  the  real  sunshine  I  can  get  in  my  studio."  "Hm,  hm," 
said  Whistler.  "And  so,  I  suppose,  if  you  were  a  musician  and 
wanted  to  compose  a  blacksmith's  chorus,  you  would  go  to  the 
smithy's  and  put  your  ear  close  to  the  anvil,  and  get  all  the  noise 
you  could?" 

Tuesday,  October  i6th.  A  meeting  here  of  the  International  Com 
mittee  was  called  for  eight — and  Whistler  and  Webb,  his  lawyer, 
dined  with  us  first;  Mr.  Webb  was  late,  so  that  dinner  was  hurried. 
The  talk  was  chiefly  of  the  International  and  the  chances  of  an 
Exhibition,  and  the  gallery  where  it  might  be  held.  Thomson's 
suggestion  that  the  Society  might  claim  the  Royal  Academy  as  a 
public  building  was  discussed.  Whistler  evidently  liked  the  sug 
gestion,  but  Webb  thought  all  the  facts  should  be  known  before 
the  proposition  was  made  to  the  Committee.  He  was  afraid  there 
might  be  a  reason  against  it  somewhere;  otherwise,  why  could  not 
all  societies  of  artists  claim  it?  There  was  a  probability,  too,  now 
that  Admiral  Maxse  is  dead,  of  making  arrangements  and  better 
ones  at  the  Skating  Rink  in  Knightsbridge,  where,  after  all, 
Whistler  said,  "the  public  now  expect  to  find  us."  He  recalled 
for  Webb's  benefit  the  evening  Blaikie  dined  here  when  he  told 
Blaikie  he  was  one  of  the  McNeills  of  Barra.  His  was  the  real 
Highland  type,  Blaikie  said;  that  was  why  he  looked  so  much  like 
the  present  chief  of  the  McNeills.  "  I  am  the  chief,"  said  Whistler. 
When  the  members  of  the  Committee — only  three — came,  and 
after  he  had  kept  them  waiting  while  he  finished  his  dinner,  it  was 
funny  to  see  how  he  got  ready  to  be  received  by  them,  stopping  a 
minute  in  the  hall,  straightening  himself,  giving  a  touch  to  his 
cravat,  and  another  to  his  hair,  just  like  a  woman  on  her  way  to 
the  drawing-room. 

Webb  is  William  Webb,  Whistler's  solicitor  for  many  years.  He 
was  besides  the  solicitor  for  the  International,  and,  finally,  for 
196  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

Miss  Philip  also,  which  led  to  endless  complications.  When  the 
Whistler  Memorial  was  started,  he  became  its  solicitor  and  treas 
urer.  Mr.  Webb  certainly  did  an  enormous  amount  for  all  these 
persons  and  bodies,  and  received  in  return  little  in  cash,  but  a 
good  deal  in  kudos,  and  more  in  blame.  He  is  a  very  sporting 
person  and  loves  the  association  with  artists  and  actors,  for  many 
of  whom  he  was  the  legal  adviser.  He  was  long  Beerbohm  Tree's 
solicitor.  He  is  a  curious  type,  not  altogether  extinct  in  England, 
whom  Dickens  might  have  used. 

Whistler  was  fastidious  about  his  personal  appearance  and  was 
often  misjudged  for  it.  He  was  thought  effeminate.  Even  artists 
failed  to  understand,  with  Mr.  Walter  MacEwen  who  gave  us  his 
first  impression  of  Whistler  at  a  big  dinner  in  Paris  a  few  years 
before  Whistler's  death.  From  the  hall,  MacEwen  saw  Whistler, 
as  he  lingered  in  the  dressing-room,  arranging  his  curls  and  necktie 
before  the  glass — "posing  and  prinking" — and  MacEwen,  after 
that,  had  no  more  use  for  him  as  a  man,  not  appreciating  the  dandy 
— but  not  to  appreciate  the.  dandy  in  Whistler  was  not  to  know 
one  very  charming  and  characteristic  side  of  him.  He  was  neither 
vain  nor  effeminate.  He  simply  sought  perfection  of  finish  in 
himself  as  in  his  art,  in  his  writing — in  everything  that  con 
cerned  him. 

Saturday,  October  20th.  Dined  late  at  Heinemann's  where  Whistler 
is  staying.  Mrs.  Heinemann  was  away.  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Chalmers 
Mitchell  and  Mrs.  Ochs  were  the  others.  Somehow,  not  a  bril 
liant  dinner.  I' sat  next  to  Heinemann  and  Whistler  was  in  the 
middle  of  the  table  between  the  other  two  women,  on  the 
opposite  side,  and  I  had  little  talk  with  him.  He  was  telling 
Mrs.  Mitchell  the  story  of  the  entertainments  given  by  Lewis  of 
Lewis  and  Allenby,  which  I  think  I  have  written  out  already.  His 
favourite  memory  is  of  the  fancy  dress  party,  to  which  Tadema 
came  in  full  Roman  costume,  toga,  sandals  on  his  bare  feet,  crowned 
with  flowers,  and  wearing  eye-glasses.  I  do  not  remember  how  it 
started,  but  Heinemann  began  to  confide  to  us  what  he  does  to 
keep  the  little  hair  still  left  to  him.  He  did  not  think,  as  some  one 
suggested,  that  it  was  the  constant  cutting  or  washing  of  their 
hair  that  made  men  lose  it.  Look  at  Whistler.  "Yes,  but  give  me 
time,"  said  Whistler,  hugely  pleased  with  himself  for  saying  it. 
Upstairs,  again,  I  had  no  chance  to  talk  with  him,  until  just  before 

197 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

leaving.  "Dreadful,"  he  said,  "dreadful,  you  know,  the  way  you 
drag  me  in.  Here  is  Heinemann  throwing  down  a  letter  on  the 
table  telling  me  I  should  read  it,  and  here  you  are  asking  me  per 
emptorily  to  settle  finally  and  definitely  about  the  publication  of 
the  book,  and  saying  Heinemann  told  you  I  was  back  in  town. 
Shocking,  shocking!  Why  so  excited?"  And  he  complained  to  J. 
"you  are  bent  on  making  an  Old  Master  of  me  before  my  time." 

Nothing  in  London  amused  Whistler  so  much  as  Alma-Tadema's 
performances.  The  golden  stairs  of  his  house  Whistler  always 
called  "brazen  cheap,"  and  Tadema  he  always  described  as  "he 
of  the  St.  John's  Wooden  eye."  Once,  in  that  little  room  at 
Garlant's  where  Whistler  and  his  friends  often  lingered  in  the 
late  evening,  something  was  said  of  Tadema.  Miss  Hensman,  the 
manager,  protested.  "But  I  like  Tadema's  pictures."  Whistler 
looked  carefully  round,  then  "Hush-sh-sh,"  he  whispered,  "I 
won't  say  anything  about  it."  This  reminds  us  of  the  man  who 
could  not  quite  understand  what  it  was  he  liked  in  Japanese  prints 
and  was  puzzled  by  Whistler's  work  in  just  the  same  way.  What 
was  it?  colour — line — drawing — What?  "Well,  you  know,"  said 
Whistler,  "if  I  were  you,  I  just  wouldn't  worry  about  it!"  Poor 
Tadema!  His  fame  ended  with  his  life,  while  Whistler's  began 
with  his  death  and  has  increased  ever  since. 

As  time  went  on,  although  Whistler  always  wanted  us  to  write 
the  book,  he  did  not  want  to  be  bothered  about  it,  especially  as  his 
health  made  him  more  nervous  about  himself.  We  recognized 
this  and  bothered  him  as  little  as  possible,  and  undoubtedly  it 
was  because  we  did  not  bother  him  that  he  gave  us  so  much  infor 
mation  and  talked  so  freely  and  frankly.  A  distinct  difference  is 
seen  in  the  notes  towards  the  end  of  1900,  as  he  began  to  grow 
weaker  and  more  nervous.  The  long  talks  were  the  exceptions. 
This  year  really  marks  the  Beginning  of  the  End,  as  we  say  in  the 
Life.  The  Journal  becomes  a  chronicle  of  his  health. 

Tuesday,  October  ^oth.  A  message  from  Whistler  to  say  that  he  is 
just  back  from  Paris,  and  is  at  Heinemann's,  laid  up  with  a  bad 
cold,  and  will  Joseph  come  up  in  the  afternoon  and  bring  The 
Magazine  of  Art  and  Pall  Mall  with  him?  He  has  just  seen  The 
Daily  Chronicle  and  the  reference  to  Spielmann's  Protest  and 
Halkett's  note.  Later  on  I  got  a  telegram  asking  me  to  dinner, 
198  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

and  we  both  dined  there.  Whistler  was  fairly  tired  by  the  time  I 
arrived,  but  was  considering  the  question  whether  the  Protest  was 
libellous  or  not. 

The  matter  which  now  worried  Whistler,  though  the  worry  should 
have  been  spared  him,  came  from  the  fact  that,  after  he  had  sent 
his  own  portrait,  Brown  and  Gold,  and  one  of  Mrs.  Whibley, 
UAndalouse,  to  the  1900  Exposition  in  Paris,  Mr.  Cauldwell,  the 
American  Commissioner,  or  some  one  connected  with  the  American 
Section,  thought  it  would  be  a  good  thing  to  add  The  Little  White 
Girl  to  his  exhibit.  This  he  did,  entirely  by  invitation.  When  the 
medals  were  awarded,  the  plaque  stating  that  he  won  the  Grand 
Prix,  was  put  on  the  frame  of  The  Little  White  Girl  which  was  not 
in  competition,  as  only  works  produced  since  the  year  1889  were 
eligible.  As  we  have  said,  he  won  another  Grand  Prix  for  his 
etchings,  many  of  which  also  were  not  eligible.  A  British  art 
writer  named  M.  H.  Spielmann  took  the  occasion  to  criticise  the 
awards  in  the  American  Section  with  which  he  had  nothing  what 
soever  to  do  as  he  was  supposed  to  be  an  Englishman,  and  he  had 
the  impudence  to  suggest,  in  The  Magazine  of  Art  of  which  he  was 
editor  and  in  the  London  Graphic  to  which  he  contributed,  that 
because  the  picture  on  which  the  plaque  was  put  was  not  eligible, 
therefore  the  Grand  Prix  for  painting  should  not  be  awarded  to 
Whistler.  This  is  the  critic,  now  forgotten  as  an  art  authority, 
who  had  previously  described  Whistler's  lithographs  as  "pencil 
sketches  carefully  reproduced,"  who  had  got  hold  of  advance  sheets 
of  the  TenO 'Clock  by  methods  he  never  could  explain  and  reviewed 
it  in  The  Pall  Mall,  who  had  acquired  his  knowledge  of  art,  Whistler 
said,  by  running  to  fires  and  reporting  them,  and  who  was  last 
seen  by  Whistler  walking  down  Piccadilly  with  the  nude  on  his 
arm,  "trying  to  explain  Horsley  soit  qui  mal  y  pense"  Whistler 
was  rightly  indignant  at  Spielmann's  impudent  interference  and 
made  him  apologize  for  this  interference,  as  the  notes  record.  We 
cannot  recall  just  what  Halkett's  note  was.  Halkett  was  then 
writing  art  criticism  for  The  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  and  when  there  was 
question  of  Whistler  was,  usually  on  the  right  side. 

Thursday,  November  8th.  Came  home  at  six  to  find  Whistler  here. 
I  had  been  to  tea  at  Mrs.  Prothero's  where  I  met  Mrs.  Z.  I  asked 
Whistler  if  he  had  ever  met  her.  "No,  I  have  never  met  her,  but 
I  understand  many  have!"  He  told  us  of  a  breakfast  at  Heine- 
mann's,  where  there  had  been  some  very  British  Britons,  a  German 
1900]  199 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  himself.  One  of  the  Britons  was  bragging  about  British 
honesty  in  all  things,  in  the  Colonies,  in  the  conduct  of  the  late  war. 
"The  trouble  is,  we're  too  honest,"  he  said,  "we've  always  been 
stupidly  honest."  Whistler,  who  had  been  saying  nothing,  got  up. 
"'You  see,'  I  said  to  the  German,  'it's  now  historically  acknowl 
edged:  whenever  there  has  been  honesty  in  this  country,  there  has 
been  stupidity.'  And  with  that,  I  left  the  room." 

Friday,  November  pth.  Whistler  and  Webb  both  came  to  dinner 
to  talk  over  the  Spielmann  business,  and  there  was  little  talk  of 
anything  else.  J.  had  collected  everything  from  the  first  note  in 
The  Graphic,  the  announcement  really,  of  the  Protest  in  The 
Magazine  of  Art,  to  the  last  comment  by  Halkett  in  The  Pall  Mall. 
Webb  thought  there  was  distinctly  libel,  and  that  Spielmann's 
letter  of  explanation  in  The  Daily  Chronicle  only  aggravated  the 
case,  showing  he  knew  the  facts  he  had  suppressed.  One  thing 
Whistler  told  us  casually  is  of  importance  in  the  history  of  his 
work.  I  stated  in  The  Daily  Chronicle  that  the  date  was  plainly 
on  The  Little  White  Girl,  so  the  jury  of  acceptance  knew  what  they 
were  about  in  hanging  it.  I  was  sure,  or  thought  I  was  sure  of  it 
because  of  the  date  on  the  reproduction  in  Virtue's  Paris  Exhibi 
tion.  But  Whistler  said  that  this  was  an  old  reproduction,  and 
that,  recently,  in  working  on  the  picture  he  painted  out  the  date, 
as  he  did  not  think  there  was  any  use  of  seeing  those  great  figures 
sprawling  there.  It  was  decided  that  Webb  was  to  write  asking 
for  an  apology  from  the  different  papers — Graphic,  Magazine  of 
Art,  Pall  Mall,  Globe — beginning  with  The  Graphic.  Whistler  said 
that  when  he  sent  in  the  two  full-length  portraits — of  himself  and 
Mrs.  Whibley — both  painted  within  recent  years,  the  Committee 
begged  him  to  send  something  else,  and  The  Little  White  Girl  was 
suggested  because  it  had  never  been  seen  in  Paris.  But  this  he  did 
not  seem  to  have  mentioned  in  the  affair. 

Sunday,  November  nth.     Whistler  came  in  very  late  in  the  after 
noon.    Webb  is  to  bring  the  letter  tomorrow  when  they  all  dine 
at  Lavery's.     I  only  saw  him  for  a  minute  as  I  had  to  dress  for 
dinner,  the  Janviers  and  Fishers  coming,  and  he  could  not  stay. 
200  [1900 


PORTRAIT  OF  WHISTLER 

WOOD-BLOCK    IN    COLOUR 

Drawn  and  cut  by  William  Nicholson,  Esq. 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

Monday,  November  I2th.  Whistler,  Webb,  and  J.  all  dined  at 
Lavery's.  The  letter  wouldn't  do  at  all — too  complicated  and 
long,  and  Whistler  is  to  come  tomorrow  morning  and  go  into  the 
matter  with  J. 

Tuesday,  November  i^th.  Whistier  came  in  a  little  before  ten, 
just  as  I  was  off  to  the  Portrait  Painters.  It  was  decided  to  send 
the  letter  to  The  Graphic  only,  and  wait  developments.  Whistler 
wrote  to  Cauldwell,  the  American  Commissioner,  about  it  a  week 
ago,  and  in  answering  a  letter  from  Cauldwell  yesterday,  I  said 
that  J.  and  I  felt  an  official  word  from  him  would  clear  the  air. 
J.  went  to  the  South  Kensington  meeting  in  the  evening.  Cundall 
was  horrified  at  the  scheme  of  hanging  J.  suggested.  "Why,"  he 
said,  "if  we  hang  the  drawings  like  that,  the  Show  will  look  just 
like  the  British  Artists  when  Whistler  was  there." 
Whistler  dined  alone  with  me.  He  wanted  to  know  all  about  the 
Portrait  Painters'  show,  how  his  picture  looks,  what  the  critics 
said,  and  because  I  gathered  so  little  from  the  critics,  I  know  he 
feels  it  one  of  the  occasions  when  my  discretion  amounts  to  indis 
cretion.  I  told  him  about  MacColPs  scheme  for  presenting  a 
Rodin — the  Balzac — to  South  Kensington.  "Well,  MacColl,"  he 
said,  "always  gets  hold  of  the  wrong  end,  and,  of  course,  admires 
Rodin  for  the  things,  like  the  Balzac,  which  are  least  admirable. 
It  is  the  same  with  Manet  about  whom  he  has  been  writing  of  late. 
Manet  was  a  student,  with  a  sense  of  certain  things  in  paint,  that 
was  all.  He  never  understood  that  art  was  a  positive  science,  one 
step  leading  to  another.  He  painted  his  dark  pictures  and  they 
looked  very  well  when  you  came  to  them  at  Durand-Ruel's,  after 
wandering  through  rooms  full  of  awful  blues  and  violets  and  greens. 
But  Manet  was  so  little  in  earnest  in  them  that,  midway  in  his 
career,  he  took  to  the  violets  and  blues  and  greens  himself.  It  is 
the  same  with  many  men.  They  paint  in  one  way,  with  brilliant 
colour  say,  then  they  see  something  like  Ribot,  and  think,  O  well, 
we  had  better  try  this.  And,  in  the  end,  they  do  nothing  of  them 
selves.  Look  at  Shannon.  The  Shannon  at  the  Portrait  Painters 
is  very  weak." 
1900]  201 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Then  he  suggested  winter  vegetables,  revealing  a  surprising  knowl 
edge  of  just  how  rice  and  beets,  among  others,  were  to  be  cooked. 
And  after  dinner,  he  slept — it  was  because  he  was  sleeping  so  badly 
at  nights — and  there  was  a  fine  struggle  between  his  sleepiness  and 
his  gallantry.  And  then  Augustine  made  him  a  good  strong  grog 
for  his  cold.  And  then  Joseph  came  back  from  South  Kensington, 
bringing  the  E.  J.  Sullivans  with  him,  and  I  was  too  ill  from  the 
tropical  heat  of  the  room,  the  big  fire  I  kept  up  for  him,  to  listen 
to  anybody  or  anything. 

Thursday,  November  i$th.  Whistler  again  came  in  early,  with  the 
papers  about  the  private  view  at  the  Portrait  Painters,  and  why 
wasn't  my  article  in?  Webb  has  sent  his  letter  to  The  Graphic, 
and  The  Graphic  has  written  politely  to  say  they  have  sent  for 
Spielmann,  and  so  the  matter  rests.  It  is  certainly  too  late  for 
this  week. 

Friday,  November  i6th.  Whistler,  confined  to  the  hotel  by  his 
cold,  sent  for  J.  who  went  back  in  the  afternoon,  when  George 
Vanderbilt  and  Sturges  came  in  together.  The  latter  said  they 
were  all  talking  about  the  affair  at  the  Arts  Club,  and  also  at 
Rothenstein's  where  he  had  been  and  found  the  usual  crowd, 
Steer,  Tonks,  Fred  Brown.  They  were  still  full  of  Whistler's 
appearance  at  the  Eden  sale — he  had  ruined  prices,  they  said 

Saturday,  November  ijth.  Whistler  again  ill  in  the  hotel,  and 
again  sent  for  J.  who  went  in  the  afternoon.  But -there  is  no 
new  development. 

Monday,  November  ipth.  Whistler  dined — he  had  been  at  the 
studio  all  day,  but  was  worried  about  himself — his  cough  will  not 
go,  and  he  talks  of  Tangier.  Nothing  from  Webb.  Strange  was 
here  too,  and  Whistler  recalled  his  South  Kensington  experiences. 
"  I  was  a  youngster  at  the  time,  of  course,  but  I  knew  old  Sir  Henry 
Cole  and  the  other  South  Kensington  people  of  his  day.  I  told 
Sir  Henry  that  he  ought  to  provide  me  with  fine  studios  in  the 
Museum,  it  would,  well,  you  know,  be  an  honour  to  the  Museum. 
202  [1900 


SKETCH  OF  WHISTLER 
PEN-AND-INK 

By  Harper  Pennington  and  Evolution  of  his  Signature 


SKETCH  OF  HARPER  PENNINGTON 

PEN-AND-INK 

By  Whistler 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

Sir  Henry  always  liked  me.  It  was  in  the  days  when  Haden  was 
general  practitioner,  and  through  knowing  all  these  people  he  got 
a  post  for  his  valet  in  the  Library,  and  for  his  coachman's  son  in 
the  Science  Department."  But  later  on  he  was  fearfully  upset 
because  he  sneezed.  "That,"  he  said,  "is  something  new,  I  am 
sure,"  and  it  sent  him  home  early,  Strange  having  gone  and  got 
a  cab  for  him. 

Strange  is  E.  F.  Strange,  then  the  Keeper  of  Prints  and  Drawings 
at  South  Kensington — the  Victoria  and  Albert  Museum.  Under 
his  able  administration  that  Department  was  vastly  improved. 

Friday,  November  23rd.  Whistler  called  on  us  the  first  thing  in  the 
morning.  Spielmann  is  to  apologize  in  The  Graphic;  an  abject 
apology.  He  was  clearly  wrong;  he  is  glad  to  withdraw  the  asser 
tion;  and  he  apologizes.  J.,  who  had  gone  out  before  Whistler 
called,  when  he  came  back,  thought  Spielmann  should  be  made  to 
insert  the  apology  in  other  papers  and  went  at  once  to  see  Whistler 
about  it.  It  was  arranged  that  Whistler  and  Webb  are  to  dine 
with  us  tomorrow  evening  to  talk  it  over. 

Saturday,  November  24th.  Whistler  and  Webb  came  to  dinner. 
Webb's  plan  is,  once  the  apology  is  published  in  The  Graphic,  then 
to  demand  that  Spielmann  insert  it  in  other  papers.  Having 
admitted  his  mistake,  he  can  hardly  refuse.  Webb  has  written  to 
The  Globe.  Whistler  wandered  off  in  true  Whistlerian  style  into 
the  fact  that  the  rules  were  made  only  to  be  broken  in  cases  like 
his  own,  as  Cauldwell  had  been  ready  to  admit.  J.  warned  him 
that  it  would  be  to  his  disadvantage  to  admit  as  much  to  the 
public,  who  would  think  he  thus  put  Spielmann  in  the  right,  and 
the  final  argument  between  them  seemed,  as  so  often  before,  to 
have  come.  But,  also,  as  often  before,  it  blew  over. 
Webb  referred  to  a  paragraph  in  M .  A.  P.  It  is  the  same  apparently 
as  one  published  in  International  Art  Notes  for  November:  "An 
Art  Student  in  Paris  recently  asked  Mr.  Whistler  if  he  thought 
Nature  should  be  painted  as  she  saw  it.  The  reply  of  the  Master 
was,  'there  is  no  reason  why  you  should  not  paint  Nature  exactly 
1900]  203 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

as  you  see  her,  provided  that  you  do  not  see  Nature  exactly  as  you 
paint  her.' "  "As  usual,"  Whistler  said,  "  there  is  some  foundation, 
but  the  story  is  garbled.  I  was  going  round  the  school  one  morning, 
the  students  all  following  me,  listening  and  breathing  hard  at  my 
neck,  when  I  came  to  a  lady  who  had  not  been  there  very  long. 
Her  palette  was  a  mess.  I  pointed  to  different  little  dabs  of  colour, 
and  asked  her  if  she  saw  anything  like  that  in  the  model?  O, 
she  said,  then  you  want  me  to  paint  things  as  I  see  them?  Well, 
yes,  I  thought,  it  would  not  be  a  bad  idea.  Excellent,  excellent! 
A  few  weeks  later,  I  was  again  making  the  round,  the  students 
again  at  my  back,  breathing  and  listening  hard,  and  I  came  to  the 
lady,  'I  believe/  I  said,  'this  is  the  lady  who  wanted  to  know  if 
she  was  to  paint  things  as  she  saw  them?'  Yes,  she  said,  she  was. 
*  Excellent,'  I  said,  'but  the  shock  will  come  the  day  you  see  them 
as  you  paint  them!"'  J.  told  him  of  the  young  lady  from  Chicago 
who  was  here  this  morning,  interviewing  him — wanting  to  know 
everything,  even  whether  he  was  born  or  not.  Whistler  interrupted 
him :  "  You  should  have  answered, '  Yes,  Madam,  born,  not  made.' " 
The  evening  ended  with  a  violent  discussion  about  Kruger  who, 
Whistler  declares,  has  done  the  one  and  only  right  thing  in  coming 
to  Europe.  Webb  undertook  to  tell  us  the  "logic"  of  the  South 
African  business,  and  between  them  they  kept  us  up  till  midnight. 
J.  fought  everybody  about  Kruger. 

Sunday,  November  25th.  Whistler  and  Cauldwell,  and  the  Heine- 
manns  to  dinner.  I  had  little  chance  to  talk  to  Whistler.  He  told 
us  one  story  at  dinner  that  shows  how  ready  he  is  to  appreciate 
anything  in  the  shape  of  drollery,  even  at  his  own  expense.  It  was 
at  the  Academic.  "I  had  been  talking  to  one  of  the  students 
about  her  work,  and  half  the  time  she  seemed  to  pay  no  attention 
to  what  I  said.  I  am  afraid,  I  told  her,  you  do  not  hear  very  well? 
'Yes,'  she  said,  'I  am  a  little  deaf;  not  altogether  an  unmiti 
gated  evil!'" 

Cauldwell  was  happy  over  the  compliments  he  has  received  for  the 
scheme  of  decoration  and  hanging  of  the  American  Section  in  Paris. 
He  spoke  of  the  intrigues  of  Dannat  head  of  the  American  artists 
204  [1900 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

in  Paris.  Whistler,  with  characteristic  unwillingness  to  see  what 
he  does  not  want  to  see,  laughed  at  the  idea  of  Dannat's  having 
any  influence  at  all  in  Paris.  But  Cauldwell  thought  he  would  have 
not  a  little  in  the  coming  decorations  to  Americans.  That  there 
might  be  no  mistake  about  the  official  feeling  anyway,  he  sent  in 
three  names  of  which  the  American  Commission  approved  if 
decorations  were  to  be  given  to  any  American  artists. 

John  B.  Cauldwell  was  the  American  Commissioner  of  Art  at  the 
Paris  Exposition.  He  was  naturally  anxious  to  have  Whistler's 
work  a  feature  of  his  Section,  but  at  first  he  scarcely  knew  the  right 
way  to  approach  Whistler.  One  of  the  first  things  he  did  on  arriv 
ing  in  Paris  was  to  ask  Whistler  to  call  on  him  at  four  o'clock  sharp. 
He  began  to  understand  when,  a  few  days  afterwards,  Whistler 
wrote,  saying  he  never  had  been  and  never  would  be  any  place  at 
four  o'clock  sharp.  After  that,  we  had  several  enjoyable  evenings 
in  London  together.  One  of  the  decorations  went  to  Whistler, 
who  was  made  an  Officer  of  the  Legion  of  Honour. 

Thursday,  November  29th.  Were  both  to  dine  with  Whistler,  but 
he  was  ill  in  bed,  and  so  we  dined  with  Webb  alone  and  went  with 
him,  and  without  Whistler  to  see  Herod  at  Her  Majesty's. 

Saturday,  December  1st.  Whistler  came  to  dinner,  was  better  but 
more  depressed  than  I  have  seen  him,  ordered  off  at  once  by  the 
Doctor,  who  wants  him  to  go  somewhere  by  sea.  He  talked  of  the 
American  pictures  bought  for  the  Luxembourg.  "Really,"  I  told 
Benedite  the  Director,  "  it  was  high  time  for  me  to  take  my 
Mummy  away  from  his  hotel!"  Spielmann's  apology  is  in  The 
Graphic  to-day.  The  Globe  agrees  to  apologize — four  hundred 
Englishmen  have  surrendered  to  the  Boers — this  morning  brought 
the  news  of  Oscar  Wilde's  death.  "Really,"  little  Sturges  said 
to  him,  "what  a  week  you  have  had!"  But  he  was  too  tired  to  rise 
to  it,  and  he  slept  the  greater  part  of  the  evening. 

M.  Benedite,  lunching  with  us  on  the  day  of  the  opening  of 
the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  in  London  1905,  in  the  course 
of  much  Whistler  talk  said  it  was  the  purchase  of  a  Burne-Jones 
for  the  Luxembourg  that  caused  Whistler  to  protest.  "Really, 
1900]  205 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

after  that,  he  did  not  know  if  he  could  leave '  his  Mother  in 
M.  Benedite's  auberge" 

Tuesday,  December  4th.  Whistler  wrote  to  us  to  ask  if  he  could 
come  to  dinner.  He  expects  to  get  off  on  Friday  of  this  week. 
He  was  too  tired  to  do  much  but  sleep. 

Thursday,  December  $th.  Whistler  and  Miss  Philip  dined — we  had 
asked  them  for  the  last  evening  but  the  journey  is  put  off  again. 
He  was  down  about  the  way  things  were  going  in  Paris  in  his 
dispute  with  the  lady  in  the  apartment  above  him  in  the  Rue  du 
Bac.  She  would  beat  her  carpets  out  of  the  window  into  their 
garden,  and  there  was  no  way  of  stopping  her.  He  tried  the  law, 
but  was  told  he  must  have  disinterested  witnesses,  outside  the 
family.  "What  can  I  do?  I  might  engage  a  detective  and  a  month 
might  pass  before  she  would  do  it  again.  But  not  long  since,  in 
the  very  act  of  brushing,  she  or  her  servant  let  a  carpet  fall  down 
into  my  garden  and  my  servant  refused  to  give  it  up.  The  old 
lady  went  to  law,  and  my  lawyer  advised  me  to  give  up  the  carpet." 
It  depressed  him  hopelessly — thought  he  must  start  for  Paris  at 
once — -it  was  always  the  way — people  always  got  the  better  of  him. 
But  the  extraordinary  part  of  it  to  me  was  that  he  should  bother 
about  such  trifles,  or  get  involved  in  them.  Then  The  Globe  pub 
lished  an  apology,  but  not  exactly  as  he  wanted  it.  Altogether, 
he  saw  everything  blue,  and  for  the  first  time,  went  to  sleep  long 
before  dinner  was  over.  Sullivan  and  Hartley  came  in  afterwards, 
but  it  could  not  rouse  him,  he  talked  steamships  with  Joseph  and 
left  at  an  unusually  early  hour. 

Monday,  December  loth.  The  Sauters  and  the  Waltons  to  dinner, 
as  an  International  Sub-Committee  Meeting,  with  Mr.  Webb,  was 
to  be  held  afterwards  at  nine.  Whistler  not  yet  gone,  came  in 
when  dinner  was  almost  over.  "Lowered  in  tone — the  Doctor 
says  I  am — well,  you  know,  the  result,  no  doubt,  of  living  so  long  in 
the  midst  of  English  pictures."  But  he  was  too  low,  even  for  the 
usual  jest  with  Augustine,  who  saw  he  was  in  no  humour  to  be 
"scolded."  However,  a  little  dinner  and  the  Spielmann  affair 
206  [1900 


X"~ 


CAFE,  CORSICA 

PEN-AND-INK 


na^  y  W'WTvy.1:' -  f  J 

fPCl 

TOblwlfi 


THE  FORGE 

PEN-AND-INK 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 
(See  page  209) 


FAILING  HEALTH  AND  His  WANDERINGS 

woke  him  up.  He  went  through  it  all  for  the  benefit  of  the  Sauters 
and  Waltons — and  then  the  Boers  came  next.  But  he  left  at  once 
after  the  Committee  Meeting  and  I  saw  little  of  him. 

Wednesday,  December  I2th.  Whistler  telegraphed  us  that  he  would 
come  to  dinner.  J.  was  lecturing  at  the  Automobile  Club — and 
he  dined  with  me  alone.  He  leaves  on  Friday.  The  Chairman 
of  the  P.  &  O.  Company,  Sir  Thomas  Sutherland,  has  given  him 
letters  to  the  Manager  and  the  Captain,  recommending  that  every 
thing  should  be  done  for  him,  and  this,  and  the  little  attentions  it 
implies,  seemed  to  reconcile  him  to  going.  He  sails  for  Gibraltar, 
and  from  there,  probably  to  Tangier  and  Algiers.  He  slept  calmly 
after  dinner.  Tried  to  shake  it  off,  said  it  was  shocking,  but  could 
not  help  himself,  and  slept  again.  After  his  grog,  about  half  past 
ten,  went  home. 

Friday,  December  i^th.  After  breakfast,  J.  went  round  to  say  good 
bye  to  Whistler.  Found  him  in  all  the  disorder  of  packing,  wishing 
he  had  not  decided  for  Tangier  and  waiting  for  Mr.  Philip  who  is 
to  go  with  him.  J.  left  him  to  his  packing,  and  we  now  wait  to 
see  if  he  really  gets  off. 

He  did  get  off  the  next  morning. 

One  matter  which  E.  did  not  note  was  rather  important.  The 
day  before  he  left,  he  hurriedly  sent  round  ten  or  a  dozen  copper 
plates  to  have  them  grounded,  wanting  to  take  them  with  him  the 
next  day.  J.  grounded  them  at  once  as  Whistler  asked,  and 
Whistler  packed  them  up  in  his  shirts,  J.  telling  him,  however,  that 
the  ground  would  probably  come  off  as  it  was  not  properly  cooled 
and  fixed.  He  drew  on  some  of  them  in  Corsica,  may  be  on  all, 
and  tried  to  bite  a  few.  But  the  ground  did  come  off,  as  J.  warned 
him  it  would,  though  even  then  the  designs  could  have  been 
preserved  if  Whistler  had  only  known  how,  as  we  know  now.  If 
the  executrix  still  has  the  plates  with  the  drawings  on  them  they 
could  easily  be  bitten  by  Sir  Frank  Short  and  printed.  When 
Whistler  returned,  he  blamed  the  whole  thing  on  J.  But  J.,  as 
usual,  refused  to  be  blamed  and  one  of  the  worst  of  all  rows  between 
them  blew  over  like  all  the  rest. 
1900]  207 


CHAPTER  XIII:  THE  RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND 
WHISTLER'S  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND.  THE  YEAR  NINE 
TEEN  HUNDRED  AND  ONE 

Friday,  May  loth,  1901.  Got  back  from  Paris  and  the  Salons  a 
little  after  six  to  be  met  at  Charing  Cross  Station  by  Augustine 
in  a  great  state  of  excitement.  M.  Whistler  had  arrived  from 
Corsica  this  morning,  and  had  come  to  see  me  just  as  she  was 
starting  to  the  station  to  meet  me.  He  walked  back  to  Charing 
Cross  with  her,  everybody  staring.  He  had  on  a  big  overcoat,  the 
brown  one,  and  a  little  round  felt  hat,  en  voyage;  she,  as  usual 
en  cheveux.  He  asked  for  all  the  news  and  she  invited  him  to 
dinner.  Madame  would  not  be  pleased  if  he  did  not  dine,  and  there 
were  pigeons  for  dinner,  just  what  he  liked!  I  got  home  and  had 
just  changed  my  gown  when  he  arrived.  "Positively  shocking 
and  no  possible  excuse  for  it,  but — well — here  I  am."  He  looks 
infinitely  better,  like  himself  again.  He  was  full  of  his  journey 
back,  on  a  P.  and  O.  steamer  from  Marseilles.  "There  I  fell  into 
the  midst  of  the  Islanders,  and  after  so  many  months  away! 
Nobody  but  English  on  board.  After  months  of  not  seeing  them, 
really  they  were  amazing.  There  they  all  were  at  dinner,  you  know, 
the  women  in  low  gowns,  the  men  in  dinner  jackets.  They  might 
look  a  trifle  green,  they  might  suddenly  run  when  the  ship  rolled, 
but  what  matter?  There  they  were,  men  in  dinner  jackets,  stew 
ards  behind  their  chairs  in  dinner  jackets,  and  so,  all's  right  with 
the  country.  And,  do  you  know,  it  made  the  whole  business  clear 
to  me  down  there  in  South  Africa — what  ?  At  home,  every  English 
man  does  his  duty,  appears  in  his  dinner  jacket  at  the  dinner  hour, 
and  so  what  difference  does  it  make  what  the  Boers  are  doing? 
All  is  well  with  England!  You  know,  you  might  just  as  well  dress 
to  ride  in  an  omnibus!" 

As  to  himself:  "I  have  discovered,  at  last,  what  is  the  matter  with 
me.  It  never  occurred  to  me  before.  At  first,  at  Ajaccio,  though 
I  got  through  little,  I  never  went  out  without  a  sketch  book  or  an 
etching  plate.  I  was  always  meaning  to  work,  always  thinking 
I  must.  Then  the  Curator  of  the  Museum  offered  me  the  use  of 
his  studio.  The  first  day  I  was  there,  he  watched  me,  but  said 
208  [1901 


•J] 


WHISTLER  SKETCHING  IN  CORSICA 

PHOTOGRAPH 

By  William  Heinemann 


m 


"II' \ 


A  STREET  IN  CORSICA 

PEN-AND-PENCIL 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

nothing  until  the  afternoon.  Then,  'But,  Mr.  Whistler,  I  have 
looked  at  you,  I  have  been  watching.  You  are  all  nerves.  You 
do  nothing.  You  try  to  but  you  cannot  settle  down  to  it.  What 
you  need  is  rest,  to  do  nothing,  not  to  try  to  do  anything.'  And 
then,  all  of  a  sudden,  you  know,  it  struck  me  I  had  never  rested, 
I  never  had  done  nothing,  it  was  the  one  thing  I  needed.  And  I 
put  myself  down  to  doing  nothing — amazing,  you  know.  No  more 
sketch  books,  no  more  etching  plates.  I  just  sat  in  the  sun  and 
slept.  I  was  cured.  You  know,  Joseph  must  sit  in  the  sun  and 
sleep.  Write  and  tell  him  so!" 

After  he  left  London  in  the  early  winter,  Whistler  had  gone 
straight  to  Gibraltar,  and  then  to  the  African  coast,  and  zigzagged 
back  between  Tangier,  Algiers  and  Marseilles,  hunting  for  warm 
weather,  which  he  did  not  find.  Finally,  he  went  to  Corsica  and 
there  he  did  find  it.  He  tried  to  work  all  the  while  and  made, 
among  other  things,  a  series  of  little  pen  and  pencil  drawings,  some 
of  which  were  purchased  by  Richard  A.  Canfield.  He  wrote  to 
us  only  once  or  twice.  But  he  got  Mr.  Heinemann  to  join  him  in 
Corsica,  and  there  they  spent  some  time  together,  and  he  worked 
on  one  or  more  of  his  copper  plates,  the  ground  of  which  came  off, 
as  we  have  said.  J.  was,  as  usual  at  this  time  of  the  year,  away 
when  Whistler  got  back. 

We  were  often  amused  at  his  conviction  that  J.  must  be  in  need 
of  the  same  remedies  and  should  be  forced  to  take  them.  Once, 
when  ill  in  bed  at  the  Rue  du  Bac,  in  the  hands  of  the  Doctor,  he 
sent  E.  word  that  J.,  who  had  nothing  in  the  world  the  matter 
with  him,  must  have  a  Doctor  too,  must  learn  there  were  other 
things  besides  his  Yankee  patent  cherry  drug,  a  tonic  we  had  come 
upon  at  a  chemist's  in  the  Strand  and  patriotically  invested  in  as 
our  unfailing  pick-me-up,  while  Whistler  scoffed. 

Sunday,  May  I2th.  Whistler,  Kennedy,  and  Landor  came  to 
dinner.  Whistler  told  them  too  about  the  dinner  jacket.  But  the 
talk  was  mostly  on  the  Boers,  and  I  thought  every  minute  war 
would  break  out  between  him  and  Kennedy.  The  evening  was 
spent  by  me  chiefly  in  preventing  it. 

Landor  is  A.  H.  Savage  Landor,  the  traveller,  who  at  one  time 
stayed  much  at  Heinemann's  flat.  Whistler  was  very  fond  of  him, 
as  we  all  were.  When  Landor  escaped  from  Thibet,  Whistler  sent 

209 
14 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

him  a  telegram  of  congratulations,  one  of  the  first  he  received  at 
the  frontier.  Landor  could  tell  stories  and  act  them  even  better 
than  he  wrote,  and  we  shall  never  forget  the  morning  when,  with 
a  hearth  rug  for  a  kimono,  he  ate  an  imaginary  dinner  out  of  an 
inkstand  with  two  pencils  for  chopsticks,  and  described  the  talk 
of  the  whole  company  with  whom  he  was  dining.  Or,  another 
time,  when  he  told  how  in  pumps  he  won  a  hare  and  hound  race 
in  the  Scotch  Highlands,  and  how,  in  the  same  light  shoes,  he 
climbed  the  Himalayas. 

Friday,  May  i"jih.  Dined  at  Mr.  Heinemann's  and  Whistler  was 
there,  but  I  had  no  chance  for  more  than  a  word  or  two.  There 
was  a  big  party. 

Monday,  May  2Oth.  Whistler  and  the  Sauters  came  to  dinner. 
Talk  all  of  Boers.  But  he  told  us  of  a  wonderful  cake  he  had  eaten 
at  Ajaccio.  "After  I  had  begun  my  rest  cure,  I  used  to  saunter 
up  every  day  to  the  pastry  cook's,  where  they  make  wonderful 
cakes,  buy  a  large  supply,  bring  them  back,  and  devour  them  all 
alone  when  I  sat  in  the  sun  in  the  afternoon.  Shocking!  Well, 
you  know,  one  day  I  saw  a  most  beautiful  cake,  of  a  wonderful 
golden  colour.  What  ?  It  was  fairly  big,  but  it  looked  uncommonly 
good,  and  I  bought  it.  I  took  it  home,  I  went  upstairs  to  my  bed 
room,  and  I  began.  It  was  crisp,  fresh,  but  with  the  first  mouthful, 
I  was  appalled  at  the  flavour.  Tried  a  second,  a  third,  then  rang 
the  bell  and  presented  it  to  the  maid.  The  next  day  I  told  the 
Curator  and  the  mystery  was  explained.  It  was  a  cake  peculiar 
to  Ajaccio  and  made  there  ever  since  the  days  of  the  old  Romans, 
a  cake  of  honey  and  oil  they  offered  in  sacrifice  at  their  great  spring 
festival.  I  was  enchanted.  The  Roman  tradition  is  almost  as 
fine  as  the  West  Point  tradition." 

Sunday,  May  26th.  Dine  alone  with  Whistler  and  Kennedy  at 
Garlant's. 

Monday,  May  27th.     Dined   at  Heinemann's  and  Whistler  was 
there,  but  it  was  again  a  big  dinner  party,  about  sixteen.    He  was 
at  the  other  end  of  the  table,  and  I  hardly  had  a  chance  for  more 
than  two  words. 
2IO 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

Sunday,  June  2nd.  Whistler  and  Kennedy  both  dined  with  me, 
but  nothing  special  to  record.  Chiefly  Boer  and  the  old  facts 
and  arguments. 

Saturday,  June  i$th.  A  visit  from  Whistler  and  Kennedy  in  the 
evening. 

Wednesday,  June  26th.  Whistler  came  to  dinner — no  one  else,  but 
in  the  hurry  of  Helen's  coming  next  week  and  the  confusion  of 
Augustine's  going  made  no  record. 

This  is  one  of  the  periods  when  the  notes  became  brief  and  scanty, 
but  they  give  at  least  a  suggestion  of  the  reason.  Whistler  was 
away  now  and  then.  J.  spent  the  late  spring  and  all  the  summer 
and  autumn  of  1901  in  Venice.  Helen  is  Helen  Robins,  E.'s  sister 
who  came  to  spend  a  month  in  Buckingham  Street  when  they  were 
to  go  on  together  to  Venice  and  join  J.  and  this  meant  much  work 
to  be  finished  first  and  arrangements  to  be  made  with  an  under 
study  on  the  papers  E.  worked  for.  While  Augustine's  occasional 
and,  we  thanked  Heaven,  short  journeys  were  the  cause  of  such 
confusion  for  our  small  household  which  depended  on  her,  that  the 
wonder  was  not  so  much  that  E.  did  not  just  then  make  fuller 
notes  of  her  meetings  with  Whistler,  but  rather  that  she  made  any. 

Thursday,  July  i6th.  Whistler,  Landor,  Rhodes,  Miss  Edith  Pettit 
and  Helen  to  dinner.  Whistler  indignant  with  the  young  American 
who  shaves  off  his  moustaches,  just  as  he  turns  up  his  trousers, 
simply  because  it  is  the  fashion  in  Piccadilly.  "Well,  you  know," 
he  said  to  Rhodes,  "you  would  be  far  more  distinguished  with  a 
moustache."  West  Point  much  to  the  front.  "To  try  this  recent 
hazing  case  in  a  court  or  by  court  martial — to  take  a  cadet  into 
court — you  know — destructive  to  the  whole  morale  of  the  place. 
In  my  time  there  were  no  laws  to  forbid  this  or  that.  There  was 
the  unwritten  law  of  tradition.  The  boys  were  on  their  honour 
and  nothing  held  them  more  firmly.  It  was  such  a  disgrace  to 
offend  against  these  unwritten  laws  that  the  offender's  career  was 
ruined  forever." 

Rhodes  is  Harrison  Rhodes,  writer  of  short  stories  and  successful 
plays,  then  living  in  London,  just  round  the  corner  from  us  in 

1901]  211 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

York  Buildings,  which  gave  Augustine  her  name  for  him,  le  Mon 
sieur  du  Quartier.  Miss  Petti t,  now  Mrs.  Adolphe  Borie,  is  a 
Philadelphian  so  that  the  party  that  evening  was  almost  entirely 
American  and  therefore  the  more  to  Whistler's  liking.  If  Whistler 
never  went  back  to  his  own  country,  if  he  could  not  stand  American 
papers,  he  never  lost  his  pleasure  in  seeing  his  own  countrymen. 

Thursday,  August  1st.  Whistler  and  Kennedy  came  to  dinner.  A 
quiet  evening,  everybody  tired.  The  band  played  Offenbach  to 
Whistler's  delight.  He  kept  time  with  his  foot,  giving  a  little 
cancan  sort  of  kick  with  it  at  the  end.  "Well,  you  know,  there  is 
music  that  really  has  distinction."  A  most  wonderful  essay  on 
art  in  brown  covers,  by  Arthur  Haden,  sent  me  for  review  by  The 
Daily  Chronicle,  was  lying  on  the  table.  Whistler  told  me  what 
I  did  not  know,  this  Arthur  Haden  is  his  nephew.  He  saw  my  note 
about  it  in  The  Daily  Chronicle.  "Ha!  ha!  you  didn't  know  and 
I'm  glad  of  it.  As  it  is,  you  didn't  hesitate  to  abuse  it  because 
of  its  absurd  and  wordy  obscurity.  Had  you  known,  you  might 
have  hedged.  You  always  are  so  polite  to  Seymour  Haden,  and 
I  can  never  understand  why?" 

Our  Buckingham  Street  windows  overlooked  the  Embankment 
Gardens  where,  directly  below,  the  County  Council  band  played 
from  seven  to  ten  every  evening  through  the  summer.  Its  noise 
was  often  an  interruption  to  talk,  but  on  hot  evenings  when  talk 
was  an  effort  even  Whistler  could  find  relaxation  in  it.  A  day  or 
two  after  this  dinner,  E.  started  for  Venice  and  did  not  return 
until  September. 

Thursday,  September  I2th.  The  first  evening  and  Whistler  dines 
with  me  after  my  return  from  Venice.  Helen  still  with  me.  The 
Hammonds,  her  friends  from  Memphis,  Tennessee,  dining  with  us. 
Whistler  fine  on  West  Point  and  niggers,  but  chiefly  what  I  have 
heard  before  and  noted.  He  was  in  his  most  charming  mood. 
Explained  the  Ruskin  case  to  Mr.  Hammond,  who  is  a  lawyer, 
and  read  bits  from  The  Gentle  Art  which  I  got  out  for  him. 

One  of  the  most  extraordinary  things  that  has  happened  lately  is 
that,  now  Whistler  has  come  into  his  own,  the  English  are  again 
212  [1901 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

trying  to  re-incarnate  Ruskin.  The  French  tried  years  ago,  and 
failed,  but  the  English  have  returned  to  their  prophet.  Not  as  a 
literary  person,  however,  but  as  an  artist.  A  show  of  his  work  has 
been  held  at  the  Royal  Academy,  where  one  for  Whistler  was  never 
suggested  officially.  Some  Academicians,  after  his  death,  did  make 
the  suggestion  but  quite  unofficially,  and  J.  and  Heinemann  at 
once  put  a  stop  to  their  schemes — to  the  Academy's  patronage  of 
Whistler  postponed  until  it  was  too  late  to  be  of  advantage  to  him, 
but  would  bring  shillings  to  the  Academy  coffers.  During  his  life 
the  Academicians  spurned  him.  And  it  should  be  stated  here  that 
Whistler's  name  was  put  down  at  one  time  for  membership  in  the 
Royal  Academy  of  Arts,  but  he  was  never  elected.  We  do  not  know 
if  his  name  ever  came  up  for  election,  according  to  the  custom  of 
the  Academy,  though  we  are  positive  that  to  the  day  of  his  death 
he  would  have  accepted  membership,  just  as  he  would  have 
accepted  the  knighthood  which  he  and  everybody  else  thought 
would  be  given  him  when  he  was  President  of  the  Society  of 
British  Artists  and  obtained  for  it  the  title  of  Royal.  But  the 
knighthood  was  reserved  for  his  successor,  Wyke  Bayliss,  long 
since  forgotten.  And  the  Academy  elected  George  H.  Boughton, 
his  contemporary,  G.  D.  Leslie,  another  contemporary,  and  later, 
John  S.  Sargent,  Edwin  A.  Abbey,  Mark  Fisher,  J.  J.  Shannon, 
all  Americans.  These  artists,  had  they  wished,  could  easily  have 
elected  Whistler.  But  they  did  not,  and  it  is  to  their  everlasting 
credit,  and  to  the  loss  of  the  Academy  upon  which  he  could  have 
conferred  honour  and  dignity.  Had  they  made  him  their  second 
American  President,  it  would  have  vastly  increased  the  Academy's 
prestige  in  Europe.  George  Boughton  said,  however,  that  he  would 
not  have  elected  Whistler  president  of  an  East-end  boxing  club, 
and  Sargent  never  said  anything.  Facts  like  these  must  be  recorded 
that  timidity  shall  not  prevail.  Sargent,  during  his  Academic  life, 
has  done  more  for  poor  artists  than  almost  anybody.  But  it  would 
have  added  to  his  renown  had  he  used  his  great  influence  in  secur 
ing  for  Whistler  the  official  rank  in  England  which  was  Whistler's 
due.  As  it  is,  it  will  be  always  remembered  that  while  Sargent 
was  a  distinguished  member  of  the  Royal  Academy,  Whistler  was 
kept  outside  and  Rodin  was  never  even  represented  in  its  exhibi 
tions.  That  Whistler  felt  the  neglect  or  indifference,  there  can  be 
no  doubt,  though  he  was  ever  ready  for  a  light  jest  at  the  expense 
of  the  Academy.  One  evening  at  a  Chelsea  Arts  Club  dinner,  when 
something  was  said  about  the  Academy  exhibitions,  Phil  Morris 
reproached  him:  "But,  Whistler,  you  have  sent  to  the  Academy!" 
And  Whistler  told  him,  "Yes,  I  have  sent  and  I  have  been  hung — 
1901]  213 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and,  again,  I  have  sent  and  I  have  not  been  hung.  Well,  you  know, 
the  Academy  is  like  an  omnibus — you  can  pay  your  penny — and 
again  if  there  is  no  seat  for  you,  you  can't."  Another  story  is  of 
his  lunching  at  the  Cavour  in  Leicester  Square  and,  not  having 
enough  money  to  pay,  writing  his  name  on  the  bill  and  saying  he 
would  settle  when  it  was  sent  him.  The  waiter  looked  at  his  name, 
"But  I  do  not  know  you,"  he  said.  "Dear  me!"  said  Whistler, 
putting  up  his  monocle  staring  at  the  waiter,  then  letting  it  drop 
in  his  hand,  "you  must  be  an  R.  A."! 

Whistler  laughed  at  Ruskin  as  he  laughed  at  the  Academy.  As 
we  wrote  in  the  Life,  he  laughed  away  his  cares.  A  Ruskin  story 
that  we  believe  has  never  been  printed  is  of  an  old  lady  who  met 
him  once  at  dinner  and  was  impressed  at  meeting  an  artist — she 
knew  little  of  artists,  having  always  lived  in  the  country,  she  con 
fided  to  him.  "But,"  she  added,  "  I  have  a  cousin  who  is  an  artist. 
Perhaps  you  have  heard  of  him — John  Ruskin."  Whistler  leaned 
over  sympathetically  and  said:  "Really,  Madam,  you  must  not 
let  it  distress  you  too  much.  We  all  have  our  relations  of  whom 
we  are  ashamed." 

His  management  of  the  International  Society  is  the  best  proof  of 
the  distinction  he  could  have  given  to  the  Royal  Academy. 

Monday,  September  i6th.  A  most  dreadful  moment — Helen  and 
I,  coming  home  at  the  dinner  hour,  found  the  McLure  Hamil- 
tons  here,  and  I  asked  them  to  stay.  Hardly  had  I  asked  them 
when  a  note  came  from  Whistler  saying,  if  I  was  quite  free  "of 
the  enemy,"  he  would  like  to  invite  himself  to  dinner.  Had  to 
write  and  say  "the  enemy"  were  in  full  force,  and  wouldn't  he 
come  tomorrow? 

The  McLure  Hamiltons  were  and  are  our  friends,  but  Whistler 
gave  Hamilton  a  high  rank  among  his  "enemies"  as  he  called  all 
who  ever  offended  him.  The  trouble  in  this  case  was  that  Hamil 
ton,  for  some  unknown  reason,  after  Sheridan  Ford  broke  with 
Whistler,  helped  Ford  in  many  ways,  and  even  lent  him  money, 
Whistler  believed,  to  produce  his  edition  of  The  Gentle  Art  which 
was  dedicated  to  McLure  Hamilton,  though  Hamilton  says  he 
refused  the  dedication  when  Ford  proposed  it  before  the  book  was 
published.  This  Whistler  never  forgave  and  he  told  McLure 
Hamilton  what  he  thought  of  him  one  evening  at  the  Hogarth 
Club,  also  in  a  letter,  and  they  had  not  met  since.  E.,  knowing 
all  this,  knowing  Whistler's  feeling,  could  hardly  have  let  him 

214 


SMITHS,  AJACCIO 

CHALK 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


(See  page  209) 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

come  to  dinner  under  the  circumstances.  It  would  not  have  been 
particularly  agreeable  to  any  one  concerned.  Hamilton  wrote  an 
account  of  his  relations  with  Sheridan  Ford  for  the  Life,  where  it 
will  be  found.  But  one  evening,  talking  the  matter  over  with  us, 
he  denied  more  emphatically  that  he  had  lent  Ford  money  to 
continue  the  work  and  he  added  a  few  other  details. 

April  28th,  190$.  Ford  was  introduced  to  him  by  John  Swan  and 
Arthur  Melville  as  an  American  journalist,  rather  hard  up,  to 
whom  he  might  be  of  use.  Ford  had  begun  work  on  The  Gentle  Art, 
but  was  in  danger  of  being  turned  out  of  his  lodgings  and,  as  the 
Hamiltons  were  going  away  they  put  a  part  of  their  house  at  his 
disposal.  Their  cook  was  left  behind,  vegetables  and  fruit  were 
in  the  garden,  they  thought  he  ought  to  manage.  Ford  and  his 
wife  seem  to  have  had  a  pleasant  time.  He  overflowed  into  other 
parts  of  the  house,  invited  friends,  Zorn  among  them.  Ford  had 
borrowed  fifteen  pounds  of  Hamilton  before  Whistler  raised  any 
objection  to  the  work.  When  the  trouble  came,  Ford  wanted 
Hamilton  to  advance  a  hundred,  which  Hamilton  refused.  Ford 
said  if  he  could  not  have  his  hundred,  he  would  tell  everybody  of 
the  first  loan  and  say  that  it  was  to  help  him  publish  his  edition 
of  The  Gentle  Art.  "And  what  do  you  think  of  that?"  he  asked. 
"Good-bye,"  said  Hamilton,  "that's  what  I  think  of  it."  If  Ford 
carried  out  his  threat,  this  would  explain  Whistler's  belief  that 
Ford  was  financed  by  Hamilton.  There  was  bound  to  be  a  meeting 
between  Whistler  and  Hamilton,  both  going  to  the  same  shows, 
the  same  private  views,  the  same  artists'  receptions,  and  it  came 
at  a  Grosvenor  Gallery  function  presided  over  by  royalty.  Their 
talk  was  probably  animated,  for  presently  Arthur  Melville  joined 
them  and  whispered  to  Hamilton,  "That's  not  the  way  to  talk  if 
you  want  to  get  on  with  Whistler."  Hamilton  laughed  and  sug 
gested  that  it  made  no  special  difference  if  he  got  on  or  not. 
Whistler  said  good-bye  amiably,  but  with  a  warning — "I  warn 
you,  don't  have  anything  to  do  with  that  fellow  Sheridan  Ford, 
he'll,  well,  you  know,  take  your  spoons!"  It  was  said  that  Arthur 
Melville  made  Ford  go  with  him  before  a  Notary  Public  and  swear 
that  Melvilie  had  lent  him  no  money. 
1901]  215 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Theodore  Roussel  claimed  that  it  was  he  who  advised  Whistler  to 
publish  The  Gentle  Art  himself,  pay  Sheridan  Ford,  and  get  rid  of 
him.  Whistler  was  living  at  21  Cheyne  Walk,  and  he  remembers 
coming  in  one  day  and  finding  Whistler  and  Mrs.  Whistler  almost 
hidden  behind  boxes  of  old  papers  and  letters,  sorting  and  arrang 
ing  them  for  the  book.  As  with  everything  concerning  Whistler, 
the  excitement  over  the  Sheridan  Ford  episode  was  tense.  Another 
incident  in  connection  with  it  is  worth  recording.  When  Sheridan 
Ford's  version  was  printed  in  Antwerp,  the  edition  was  seized  by 
Sir  George  Lewis,  then  Whistler's  solicitor.  This  always  seemed  to 
us  one  of  his  most  remarkable  performances.  What  it  seemed  to 
him,  he  once  told  us.  We  were,  at  the  time,  preparing  our  defence 
in  the  case  Miss  Philip,  brought  against  us  and  Heinemann  in 
her  unsuccessful  endeavour  to  prevent  our  writing  and  publishing 
the  Life  of  Whistler.  One  afternoon,  as  we  came  out  of  the  office  of 
Sir  George  Radford,  our  solicitor,  in  Chancery  Lane, 

January  1st,  1907,  we  ran  right  into  Sir  George  Lewis.  He  said 
he  hoped  we  were  getting  on  with  the  book,  and  he  understood  we 
were  in  the  hands  of  the  lawyers.  He  had  some  letters  for  us, 
though  Whistler  always  wrote  to  him  in  such  extravagant  terms 
of  praise,  he  was  almost  ashamed  to  show  them.  Of  course, 
he  had  been  always  glad  to  do  what  he  could  for  Whistler,  and 
had  never  charged  him,  and  there  was  the  affair  of  The  Gentle 
Art.  Yes,  Joseph  said,  and  he  had  always  wanted  to  know  about 
that,  how  it  was  done,  what  it  all  was.  "Why,  that,"  Sir  George 
said,  "I  am  afraid  was  a  bit  of  bounce!"  and  with  that  he 
left  us. 

Tuesday,  September  ifth,  igoi.  A  characteristic  letter  from 
Whistler — he  could  understand  my  joyous  emotions;  if  he  had 
added  to  them  that  was  all  right — the  letter  written  to  Helen — 
and  he  would  come  with  pleasure.  Came  with  his  pocket  full  of 
Boer  clippings.  Helen  gave  him  scraps  of  American  history  that 
delighted  him  because  of  the  parallel.  He  was  specially  charmed 
with  the  story  of  General  Marion  and  the  sweet  potatoes  and  begged 
Helen  to  get  it  for  him.  Was  in  a  state  of  excitement  over  an  article 
in  The  St.  James's  by  an  officer  giving  a  description  of  the  shock 
ing  falling  off  of  discipline  in  the  army  to  which  he,  as  a  West  Point 
man,  knew  that  the  whole  condition  of  things  in  South  Africa  is  due. 
216 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

Thursday ,  October  $rd.  Whistler  and  the  Lungrens.  came  to  dinaer. 
Not  a  very  successful  evening.  It  was  varnishing  day  at  the 
International,  an.d  Lungren  was  disappointed  at  the  way  he  had 
been  hung,  and  there  was  a  sort  of  feeling  of  restraint  over  the 
little  party.  The  talk  again  of  the  Boers. 


There  was  difficulty  that  year  in  securing  a  gallery  for  the  Inter 
national  Exhibition.  Owing  to  the  death  of  Admiral  Maxse,  the 
Skating  Rink  at  Knightsbridge  was  no  longer  available.  In  1900 
no  exhibition  had  been  held.  Whistler's  idea  was  that  the  yearly 
exhibition  should  be  an  Art  Congress,  in  which  case  it  was  useless 
to  compete  with  the  great  International  Exposition  in  Paris.  As 
the  notes  have  recorded,  it  was  at  least  proposed  that  the  homeless 
Society  should  claim  the  right  of  artists  to  Burlington  House  but 
this  was  not  followed  up,  and  as  a  last  resource,  the  spring  of  1901 
having  passed  without  any  exhibition,  the  Institute  was  taken 
for  the  purpose  in  the  autumn.  The  galleries  were  smaller  than 
those  in  which  the  Society  had  hitherto  shown,  but  lack  of  space 
could  not  induce  Whistler  to  overcrowd  and  litter  the  walls. 
Decorative  balance  and  effect  were  as  usual  respected.  He  sent 
mostly  small  works  with,  for  centre,  the  little  Phryne  which  he 
valued  highly,  and  these  were  hung  in  a  line  with  nothing  above 
or  below,  an  arrangement  which,  though  he  could  not  say  so  to 
Whistler,  was  Lungren's  grievance.  Why  should  the  number  of 
his  exhibits  have  been  limited  and  only  a  corner  found  for  the  few 
hung,  when  all  that  space  was  wasted  ?  He  was  indignant,  enlarged 
afterwards  upon  his  treatment  to  E.,  and  that  evening,  in  her 
memory  of  him,  he  was  silent  and  sulky. 

Sunday,  October  6th.  Whistler  sent  young  Teddy  Godwin  round  to 
tell  me  he  has  a  cold  and  is  in  bed,  and  wouldn't  I  come  to  the  hotel 
to  see  him?  Went  round  and  had  tea  with  him.  My  Daily  Chron 
icle  notice  on  the  bed.  "I  suppose  you  know  why  I  have  sent  for 
you?  You  know  it  is  to  reproach  you  for  having  given  the  Inter 
national  away?  But  why!  They  look  to  you  for  everything  that 
is  charming."  "Haven't  I  said  charming  things  about  you?" 
I  asked.  "Yes,  but  why  regret  Manet  and  the  others?  Why  make 
so  little  of  Lavery,  the  Vice  President?  And  why  must  you  always 
drag  in  that  dreadful  McLure  Hamilton?"  I  told  him  to  wait 
1901]  217 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  see  what  would  follow,  and  he  said  he  had  already  explained 
to  Lavery. 

E.  cannot  recall  what  crime  she  had  committed  this  time  in  her 
notice  of  the  International.  But  encounters  of  the  kind  were  not 
unusual.  To  please  herself,  to  please  her  Editor,  to  please  Whistler, 
was  not  always  an  easy  task.  But  though  Whistler  might  object, 
she  did  not  find  his  objection  fatal.  In  her  experience  he  was  as 
ready  to  forgive  as  to  take  offence,  and  the  above  note  reflects  the 
gaiety  with  which  he  took  it  on  this  occasion. 

Tuesday,  October  8th.  Called  on  Whistler  who  is  still  kept  in  bed, 
but  very  gay — approved  of  my  notes  in  The  Daily  Chronicle  Mon 
day  column  and  had  all  the  other  papers  scattered  round  him 
over  the  bed. 

Wednesday,  October  2$rd.  Dined  alone  with  Heinemann  and 
Whistler.  Whistler  staying  there  on  his  return  from  Paris,  and 
still  afraid  to  go  out  in  the  evening,  is  looking  for  rooms  up  in  that 
quarter.  Rather  a  colourless  evening. 

Thursday,  October  jist.  Whistler  and  Fisher  Unwin  came  to  dinner. 
Nothing  particular  to  note.  Chiefly  Boers. 

Saturday,  November  2nd.  Whistler  came  in  and  he  stayed  on  to 
dinner.  And  then — the  long  feared  meeting.  After  dinner  the 
Lungrens  dropped  in,  and  said  the  McLure  Hamiltons,  who  also 
had  been  dining  at  the  Cafe  Roche,  were  to  follow  presently.  There 
was  nothing  to  do,  but  I  wanted  to  run.  They  came.  Introduced 
them.  Whistler  bowed,  said  he  thought  he  had  heard  of  Mr. 
McLure  Hamilton,  and  paid  no  more  attention  to  him,  though  he 
smiled  upon  Mrs.  Hamilton.  What  was  said,  I  don't  know.  I 
was  occupied  with  the  fear  of  what  might  be  said,  of  what  might 
happen.  But  I  have  left  of  the  nightmare  of  an  evening  an  impres 
sion  of  McLure  Hamilton  rather  sad,  Mrs.  Hamilton  distinctly 
nervous,  Mrs.  Lungren  speechless,  Mr.  Lungren  helpless,  and 
Whistler,  through  it  all,  suave  and  amused.  He  left  fairly  early 
and  said  good-night  to  everyone  but  McLure  Hamilton. 
218  [1901 


PHRYNE 

OIL 

International  Exhibition,  1901 


(See  Page  217) 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

This  meeting  was  Whistler's  second  and  last  with  McLure  Hamil 
ton  after  the  Sheridan  Ford  episode.  Strange  meetings  were 
always  happening  in  Buckingham  Street,  or  else,  being  avoided  by 
the  ingenious  system  of  doors  which  sometimes  allowed  "the 
enemy"  to  foregather  in  three  rooms  without  any  one  of  them 
being  aware  of  the  other's  presence.  We  might  say  that  the  rooms 
had  been  Etty's  studio  and  apartment,  and  no  doubt  similar  com 
plications  occurred  among  Academicians  in  his  day,  and  almost 
certainly  in  Stanfield's,  Humphrey  Davey's  and  Pepys'  days,  who, 
all  three,  lived  in  the  same  house.  And  so,  as  Whistler  would  say, 
it  was  only  carrying  on  tradition.  Whistler  was  popularly  sup 
posed  to  have  no  consideration  for  anybody,  to  delight  rather  in 
making  everybody  uncomfortable.  But  the  way  he  met  "the 
enemy"  in  our  rooms  shows  how  considerate  he  could  be.  Nobody 
who  did  not  know  the  circumstances  could  have  imagined  the 
seriousness  of  the  situation  to  E.  The  Lungrens  were  con 
scious  of  something  and  were  embarrassed,  but  never  gathered 
that  Whistler  and  Hamilton  were  not  exactly  on  terms,  that  the 
occasion  was  historic  in  the  development  of  The  Gentle  Art.  Mrs. 
Hamilton,  after  his  death,  in  referring  to  an  evening  as  trying  to 
her  as  to  any  of  us,  recalled  how  quiet  and  dignified  he  was.  We 
always  felt,  and  never  hesitated  to  say  to  Whistler,  that  he  mis 
judged  Hamilton  who  had  for  him  and  his  art  a  profound  appre 
ciation  and  respect.  In  questions  of  art,  no  artist  was  in  more 
complete  sympathy  with  Whistler. 

Saturday,  November  $th.  Whistler  wrote  to  ask  me  to  try  to  come 
and  see  him  at  Tallant's  Hotel,  in  North  Audley  Street,  where  he 
is  now  established.  A  gloomy  private  hotel,  but  eminently  cor 
rect.  The  landlady  assured  him  she  entertained  royalty  and 
nobility.  "In  this  room,  sir,"  as  a  recommendation,  "Lord  Ralph 
Kerr  died."  "But,"  said  Whistler,  "I  told  her  what  I  wanted 
was  a  room  to  live  in!"  He  is  a  little  depressed  by  this  correctness, 
the  limited  supplies  and  the  high  prices.  I  found  him  in  trousers, 
white  silk  night  shirt  over  them  flowing  loose,  and  a  dinner  jacket! 
Rousseau,  who  paints  cattle,  was  with  him.  When  he  went, 
Whistler  got  me  to  dictate  to  him,  while  he  wrote  it,  a  letter  he 
had  prepared  to  his  boot-maker  in  Paris  who  objected  to  send, 
unless  prepaid,  boots  to  London.  "So  unfortunate,  you  know, 
his  experience  with  the  Islanders!"  Whistler's  letter  was  one  of 

his  stateliest  and  he  addressed  it  to  M. ,  " Maitre-Bottier" 

219 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Tallant's  in  Mayfair  was  not  far  from  Heinemann's  house  in 
Norfolk  Street.  In  it  one  was  conscious  of  what  Whistler  described 
as  the  "  lovely  respectability  of  the  British  family  hotel."  This 
autumn  Whistler  was  so  extremely  worried  about  his  health  that 
only  occasionally  was  he  in  really  good  form,  only  occasionally 
did  he  talk  in  the  old  fashion.  The  Journal  from  this  time  on,  is 
more  than  ever  the  record  of  his  health  which  it  had  begun  to  be 
the  year  before. 

Wednesday,  November  i$th.  Whistler  and  the  Janviers  came  to 
dinner.  Whistler  made  a  captive  of  Mrs.  Janvier  to  whom  he 
told  his  story  of  the  Roman  cake  in  Corsica,  so  that  after  dinner 
she  literally  got  him  in  a  corner  by  the  fire,  while  I  talked  to 
Janvier  and  Chefdeville  who  came  in  with  his  son.  Whistler  had 
arrived,  to  his  horror,  in  a  little  rain  that  began  suddenly  as  he 
was  on  his  way  here  from  Charing-Cross  Station,  and  Augustine 
had  taken  him  in  the  dining  room  and  helped  him  off  with  his 
shoes  and  lent  him  her  slippers  which,  for  fear  he  might  mind,  she 
said  were  Joseph's.  And  in  her  slippers,  with  anything  but  "dandy" 
feet  he  spent  the  rest  of  the  evening. 

Louis  Chefdeville  was  a  most  interesting  French  artist  who,  in  the 
early  Eighties,  took  up  photo-engraving  and  made,  during  his  life 
time,  which  was  a  stormy  one,  some  of  the  most  interesting  line 
and  half-tone  blocks  ever  printed  in  France  and  England.  He  did 
a  great  deal,  especially  in  England  where  he  lived  for  years  and 
until  his  death,  to  advance  the  art  of  photo-engraving. 

Thursday,  December  $rd.  Whistler  appeared  in  the  afternoon  just 
when  Mrs.  Mansfield  was  here  to  tea.  Talked  Venice  to  J. 
whom  he  now  sees  for  the  first  time  since  J.'s  return.  He  has  been 
for  the  last  fortnight  with  the  Philips  in  Tite  Street,  Chelsea, 
where  as  he  never  invites  one  to  come,  one  hesitates  to  go.  But 
glad  to  see  J.  and  enthusiastic  about  his  drawings.  Thinks  the 
St.  Mark's  most  beautiful  and  immensely  interested  in  the  charcoal. 

Mrs.  Mansfield  is  the  wife  of  the  man  who,  we  believe,  wrote  under 
the  name  of  Bowdoin,  a  life  of  Whistler  which  Whistler  probably 
never  saw.  Mrs.  Mansfield  is  an  artist:  Blanche  MacManus. 
"The  charcoal"  was  the  new  Russian  compressed  charcoal  which 
220  [1901 


.  • 


THE  FORGE,  AJACCIO 

CHALK 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


(See  page  200) 


RETURN  FROM  CORSICA  AND  LIFE  IN  ENGLAND 

had  just  been  invented.  J.  was  delighted  with  it  and  used  it  for 
his  drawings  in  Marion  Crawford's  Venetian  book — as  usual,  all 
illustrators  at  once  took  to  it. 

Saturday,  December  5th.  Whistler  came  while  we  were  still  at 
lunch  and  stayed  on  and  lunched  with  us.  He  starts  for  Bath 
this  afternoon,  and  it  is  time  he  gets  away  from  London,  for  he 
looks  more  tired  out  than  I  have  seen  him  yet.  Had  a  book  of 
American  stories  which  he  read  to  us,  especially  one  about  a  motor, 
with  such  enthusiasm  that  he  left  so  late  he  was  afraid  he  would 
lose  his  train.  He  explained  the  American  slang — had  never  heard 
most  of  it  before,  but  understood  it  by  instinct. 

During  these  weeks,  off  and  on,  he  was  with  his  mother-in-law  and 
her  daughters  in  their  Tite  Street  house,  and  when  there  we  were 
never  allowed  to  see  him.  After  his  wife's  death,  he  was  always 
moving  from  place  to  place.  It  was  the  same  in  Paris  where,  till 
he  finally  took  his  last  house  in  Cheyne  Walk,  he  kept  his  apart 
ment  in  the  Rue  du  Bac,  his  studio  in  the  Rue  Notre-Dame-des- 
Champs,  slept  in  the  Hotel  Chatham,  dined  in  the  Passage  des 
Panoramas,  had  his  studio  in  Fitzroy  Street,  his  room  at  Heine- 
mann's,  and,  as  the  notes  show,  usually  dined  with  us  when  in 
London.  No  wonder  he  described  the  whole  as  his  "collection  of 
chateaux  and  pieds-a-terre" 

At  this  time  he  was  a  sort  of  lion,  though  no  one  but  a  Frenchman 
is  ever  a  real  lion  to  Frenchmen — he  is  never  one  of  them — and 
the  longer  Whistler  stayed  in  Paris,  the  more  he  realized  it.  With 
a  few  old  friends  he  dined  in  the  Passage  des  Panoramas,  a  few 
friends  came  to  the  Rue  du  Bac,  but  he  received  no  higher  official 
recognition  than  is  bestowed  upon  dry-goods  men  and  soup  makers 
by  the  French  Government.  For  that  matter,  he  received  nothing 
officially  from  England  and  America — one  of  the  penalties  of 
expatriation,  if  you  are  an  American.  All  sorts  and  conditions  of 
men  and  women  did  their  best  to  get  at  him,  especially  Americans 
who  haunted  the  halls  of  the  Hotel  Chatham  trying  to  carry  him 
off  to  pink  teas  and  poker  parties,  or,  if  he  ventured  to  Lavenue's 
or  similar  haunts,  stood  on  chairs  to  see  him  eat  his  dinner.  As  to 
recognizing  him  really  as  the  master,  they  did  nothing.  He  had 
no  recognition  from  the  National  Academy  which  acknowledged 
all  the  lesser  men — J.  was  not  made  a  member  till  after  Whistler's 
death.  If  he  had  been,  things  would  have  been  different.  He  has 
yet  no  niche  in  the  American  Hall  of  Fame,  though  half  the  famous 

1901]  221 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

there  are  forgotten,  and  the  rest  mostly  never  have  had  even 
a  national  notoriety. 

Whistler  spent  most  of  the  winter  of  1901-02  in  Bath  which,  with 
its  old-fashioned  stateliness  and  antique  shops,  amused  him.  But 
he  was  too  near  London  to  keep  away  altogether,  and  we  had 
many  unexpected  visits  and  meetings.  J.  gave  him  introductions 
to  some  of  the  officials  of  Bath  whom  J.  happened  to  know. 
Though  they  probably  did  not  understand  Whistler,  he  was  as 
delighted  with  them  as  with  the  architecture  of  which  he  considered 
them  a  part. 

Thursday,  December  ipth.  An  International  Meeting  held  at 
Sauter's.  J.  arrives  and,  to  his  surprise,  finds  Whistler  on  the 
door  steps.  Has  come  up  for  the  purpose  from  Bath.  He  and  J. 
stay  and  dine  after  the  meeting.  I  come  for  dinner,  and  the  girl 
Sauter  so  often  paints  who  is  staying  with  them,  and  Webb. 
WThistler  in  splendid  form,  looking  as  well  as  he  looked  seedy  the 
day  he  lunched  with  us  and  said  good-bye.  Eager  to  hear  all  the 
news.  Full  of  the  Boers  upon  whom  the  talk  mostly  ran.  He  left 
early,  to  spend  the  night  as  Webb's  guest. 

Friday,  December  2Oth.  Both  Whistler  and  Webb  came  to  break 
fast.  Supposed  to  be  half-past  nine.  Got  here  at  ten  to  our  com 
plete  demoralization,  so  entirely  did  it  revolutionize  our  day. 
They  had  stopped  at  the  Charing-Cross  Hotel.  Whistler  to  go 
back  to  Bath  this  afternoon. 

These  two  notes  confirm  the  fact  of  Whistler's  interest  in  the 
International  of  which  we  have  written  several  times.  He  could 
not  keep  from  the  meeting,  though  he  had  been  in  Bath  but  a 
fortnight.  He  was  always  thinking  of  the  welfare  of  his  Society, 
sometimes  in  most  unlooked-for  ways.  Later  in  the  winter,  when 
the  Painters  in  Oil  were  about  to  open  their  exhibition  at  the 
Institute  where  the  International  had  been  held  in  the  autumn,  he 
wrote  to  E.  from  Bath  to  beg  her  to  make  the  most  of  the  compari 
son  in  her  notice  for  The  Daily  Chronicle.  Where  was  the  velarium  ? 
where  the  scientific  knowledge,  the  perfect  engineering  of  the  light, 
the  exquisite  taste?  She  was  to  rub  it  in  to  the  greater  glory  of  the 
International.  She  hopes  now  that  she  did — thinks  her  article 
this  time,  anyway,  must  have  been  to  his  liking  for  she  has  no 
record  of  being  summoned  to  receive  his  reproaches. 
222  [1901 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

We  had  carried  to  London  the  early  American  hours  which 
America  no  longer  keeps.  We  breakfasted  at  eight  on  coffee  and 
rolls,  and  by  ten  were  usually  well  on  in  our  morning's  work.  How 
ever,  Augustine  was  wonderful  in  these  emergencies;  the  Strand 
with  its  shops  was  close  at  hand;  soles,  eggs,  marmalade  and  all 
the  essentials  of  an  English  breakfast  had  been  collected  by  the 
time  Whistler  and  Webb  appeared,  and,  as  Whistler's  visits  grew 
rarer,  we  minded  less  and  less  any  trouble  they  might  put  us  to. 


CHAPTER  XIV:  FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND 
BACK.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN  HUNDRED  AND  TWO 

Saturday,  January  6th,  Twelfth  Night,  1902.  About  six,  sudden 
appearance  of  Whistler.  Up  from  Bath  again,  Miss  Philip  having 
to  come  to  see  her  dentist.  With  much  difficulty  we  persuaded 
him  to  stay  and  dine,  sending  a  telegram  to  Tite  Street.  We  have 
a  galette-au-roi  for  Twelfth  Night  and  we  open  our  last  two  bottles 
of  champagne  in  his  honour,  to  make  up  for  a  rather  poor  dinner. 

Champagne  was  a  luxury  we  indulged  in  only  this  once,  when 
O.K.  sent  us  a  case,  and  we  suppose  we  never  shall  have  any  again. 
O  thrice  and  four  times  happy  those  who  have  gone  before  from  a 
world  gone  maudlin  and  dry!  But  galette-au-roi  we  always  ate  on 
Twelfth  Night  because  Augustine  made  us,  ordering  it  from  the 
French  patissier  in  Soho  who  supplied  it  to  all  the  French  colony 
in  London.  Whistler  liked  the  crisp,  flaky  French  pastry  and,  if 
we  remember,  E.  in  cutting  the  cake  saw  that  he  got  the  little 
king  hidden  in  it,  that  brings  luck  for  the  year  to  whoever  finds  it. 

Friday,  January  loth.  Dine  at  Heinemann's.  Whistler  was  there 
— going  to  stay  all  night.  This  sort  of  weather  he  can  dine  nowhere 
where  he  cannot  take  his  bag  and  sleep.  "Qui  dine,  dort,"  he  says, 
"  Buckingham  Street  at  night,  you  know,  a  dangerous,  if  fascinating 
place."  The  Mitchells  and  Elizabeth  Robins  are  the  other  people. 
He  sits  far  from  me,  and  I  see  nothing  of  him  except  for  a  few 
minutes  after  dinner,  when  I  tell  him  that  Augustine  has  gone  to 
France  for  the  event,  that  she  has  written  and  that  she  worries 
because  she  knows  the  Englishwoman  I  have  as  substitute  will  not 
give  him  the  sort  of  petit  diner  he  likes.  "Awful,"  he  says,  "  her 
1902]  223 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

interest.  I  am  sure  It  will  look  like  me — what!"  This  is  the 
evening  J.  first  suggests  his  idea  of  the  Great  Art  Trust.  Heine- 
mann  is  interested.  Thinks  he  would  be  willing  to  put  five  thou 
sand  in  such  an  enterprise.  Whistler  is  rather  noncommittal,  but 
quite  ready  for  a  meeting  to  consider  the  suggestion. 

The  Mitchells  are  the  Chalmers  Mitchells.  Elizabeth  Robins  is 
not  E.,  though  as  an  authoress,  is  everlastingly  being  confounded 
with  her.  Augustine  had  gone  to  France,  where  the  older  of  her 
two  little  girls  was  born,  and  where  she  knew  she  would  be  for  a 
month,  and,  in  her  devotion  to  Whistler,  she  was  afraid  he  would 
get  nothing  decent  to  eat  without  her.  As  for  the  Great  Art  Trust, 
we  have  forgotten  entirely  what  J.'s  immortal  scheme  was.  It 
probably  existed  for  this  one  night  only. 

Saturday,  January  i8th.  Whistler  comes  in  about  six,  but  he 
won't  stay  to  dinner.  "Qui  dine,  dort"  he  tells  us  again,  and  we 
have  no  extra  bedroom.  Reads  a  magazine  most  of  his  visit,  and 
is  a  trifle  depressed.  "W7ell — you  know,  there  was  a  suspicion  of 
a  cough  after  I  was  here  the  last  time."  Then,  perhaps,  he  is 
worried  because  he  has  received,  like  Joseph,  an  official  notice  of 
his  medal  at  the  Paris  Exposition,  and  it  speaks  only  of  one.  "Do 
you  suppose  that  nonsense  of  Spielmann's  could  have  had  any 
influence?"  he  asks  J.  a  trifle  anxiously. 

Thursday,  January  2$rd.  Whistler  comes  in  late,  about  six. 
J.  not  back  yet  from  a  C.  T.  C.  Committee  meeting.  I  tell  him 
about  T.  A.  Cook  whom  I  had  met  a  few  evenings  before,  and  who 
spoke  of  Whistler  as  if,  at  one  time,  he  had  seen  him  often.  "I 
do  not  know  him  well  enough  to  avoid  him."  Whistler  said.  I 
explained,  it  was  in  London,  and  Cook  had  met  him  at  Charles 
Whibley's.  "Oh,  there,"  Whistler  said.  " I  went  once,  some  place 
out  in  the  remote  wilderness — you  know.  The  room  was  thick 
with  tobacco  smoke  and — well — I  never  went  again."  He  insisted 
he  could  not  stay  to  dinner,  but  J.  coming  back  from  his  meeting 
with  Archer  White,  persuaded  him  to.  There  could  have  been 
no  greater  contrast  than  between  Whistler  and  White.  White, 
growing  friendly  during  dinner,  called  him  Whistler  once — "My 
224  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

dear  Whistler" — and  I  waited,  trembling,  to  see  what  would 
happen  next.  But  I  noticed,  he  never  forgot  the  Mr.  a  second  time. 
Something  was  said  of  a  story  recently  published  about  Whistler. 
"One  thing  occurring  in  my  daily  life,  I  cannot  be  responsible  for," 
he  said,  "is  the  daily  story  told  about  me."  Archer  White  had 
been  lunching  with  Richmond  who  was  very  eager  to  be  made 
Mayor  of  Kensington.  "He  ought  to  be,"  Whistler  said,  "it 
would  explain  the  Mosaics  at  St.  Paul's,  what?" 
Whistler  had  been  to  the  Royal  Academy  and  had  seen  the  King 
ston  Lacy  Meninas.  "Well,  you  know,  it  is  full  of  things,  only 
Velasquez  could  have  done.  The  little  heads,  perhaps  weak,  but 
so  much,  or  everything  that  no  one  else  could  have  painted  just 
like  that.  And  up  in  a  strange  place  they  call  the  Diploma  Gallery 
I  saw  the  Spanish  Phillip's  copy  of  Las  Meninas,  full  of  atmosphere 
really,  and  dim  understanding."  But  it  seems  to  me  if  he  had  not 
wanted  not  to  agree  with  D.  S.  M.,  who  thinks  the  Kingston 
Lacy  picture  a  copy,  he  would  not  have  accepted  so  implicitly  the 
evidence  of  Phillip.  He  liked  too  the  Dutch  picture  of  the  Lady 
Standing  at  a  Spinet,  Ochtervelt's.  .  .  .  "Have  you  seen  any  criti 
cism  beside  D.  S.  M.'s?  I  would  like  to  get  them  all  together,  and 
write  something.  But  why  should  I  trouble  to  write?"  He  told  us 
of  his  offer  to  MacColl  of  the  Secretaryship  to  Pulitzer,  some  years 
ago  in  Paris.  "His  duties,  you  know,  would  have  been  to  drink 
the  best  champagne  and  cognac  and  to  smoke  the  best  cigars,  but 
he  would  have  been  a  slave  all  the  same.  It  would  have  saved 
him  though  from  art  criticism,  or  art  criticism  from  him." 
The  one  redeeming  feature  of  my  English  dinner — in  Augustine's 
absence — was  the  mince  pies.  "Ah,  well,  I  like  them,"  and  he 
was  immensely  pleased  when  we  poured  lighted  brandy  over  his. 
A  good  deal  of  talk  of  the  Boers.  But  he  said  little,  making  Archer 
White,  who  has  been  in  South  Africa,  do  the  talking.  A  story  on 
quite  another  subject  was  of  the  dinner  given  to  him.  After  every 
body  was  seated  and  before  the  talk  was  so  loud  that  nothing  could 
be  heard,  Justin  McCarthy  came  in  with  Menpes  on  his  arm. 
They  passed  just  behind  Whistler  to  get  to  their  places.  "Ha,  ha! 
I  called  out  to  McCarthy,  have  you  forgotten?  Damien  died! — 
1902]  225 

is 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Well,  I  don't  know  how  it  is,  but  Providence  sends  me  these 
little  things." 

One  of  J.'s  many  interests  in  those  days  was  cycling  and  he  was 
still  on  the  Council  of  the  C.  T.  C.,  the  Cyclists'  Touring  Club. 
T.  A.  Cook  is  Sir  Theodore  Andrea  Cook,  who  is  greatly  interested 
in  sport  and  literature,  and  somewhat  in  art.  He  spent  a  good 
deal  of  his  time  in  Paris  and,  we  believe,  was  for  a  while  Pulitzer's 
Secretary  there.  But,  tiring  of  it,  he  sought  a  successor  one  of 
whose  duties,  Whistler  explained  on  another  occasion,  "would  be 
the  picking  up  Pulitzer's  eyes  that  had  a  way  of  falling  out  and 
getting  lost  on  the  floor."  Whistler  said  that  Charles  Whibley 
applied  for  the  post  and,  on  being  summoned  upstairs  to  the  pres 
ence  of  the  great  man,  stumbled  into  a  priceless  Persian  pot  and 
smashed  it,  and  this  lost  him  his  chance.  "So  like  the  British 
Boulvardeer!"  said  Whistler.  This  was  a  propos  of  Whibley's 
invasion  of  Paris  at  that  time. 

Archer  White  is  a  lawyer  who  in  those  years  was  as  enthusiastic 
about  cycling  as  J.  His  tendency  was  to  be  on  hail-fellow-well-met 
terms  of  intimacy  at  once  with  everybody,  which  was  something 
that  Whistler  would  not  countenance  and  knew  how  to  put  a  stop 
to  without  a  word.  Nobody  ever  went  further  with  Whistler 
than  Whistler  chose,  which  reminds  us  of  another  incident.  Some 
body,  repeating  to  Whistler  a  story  told  of  him  by  Chase,  began, 
"And  Chase  said,  Jimmie  told  me — ."  "I  didn't  know  he  was  on 
Jimmie  terms  with  me,"  Whistler  interrupted. 
Whistler  was  right  as  to  the  daily  story  about  him.  Never  was 
there  a  man  about  whom  so  many  stories  have  been  told.  It  was 
after  our  book  appeared  that  "the  teetotal  story"  came  to  us  for 
the  first  time  in  a  version  that  explains  it,  for  before  this  it  always 
seemed  to  us  rather  pointless,  that  is  for  Whistler.  This  version 
we  heard  from  Sir  Bryan  Donkin  who  said  he  heard  it  when  it 
first  began  to  go  the  rounds  in  London.  Norman  Shaw  was  then 
prominent  as  an  architect,  and  Dr.  Norman  Kerr  was  no  less 
prominent  as  a  temperance  man,  and  itwasthetwoWhistlerwilfully 
confused.  He  was  dining  in  a  big  new  house  in  Chelsea  built  by 
Norman  Shaw  who  was  there,  and  Norman  Kerr  also  was  a  guest. 
Whistler  dined  well.  Coming  downstairs,  he  slipped  and  fell. 
"Well,  you  know,"  he  said,  "this  comes  of  dining  with  these 
damned  teetotal  architects!"  In  some  way  the  notion  got  abroad 
that  Whistler  drank  excessively,  he  never  did,  yet  we  have  a 
letter  from  Major  Butt,  who  went  down  on  the  Titanic  referring 
to  it  as  a  matter  of  unquestioned  fact.  It  is  absolutely  untrue. 
226  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

The  "Why  drag  in  Velasquez"  story  is  another  that  has  gone 
through  amazing  variations,  the  most  amazing,  Mrs.  Edwin 
Edwards'  solemn  interpretation  of  it.  She  wrote  us  that  conceit 
was  Whistler's  ruin:  "I  heard  him  say  in  our  room  before  many 
artists,  talking  of  art  and  artists — '//  y  a  moi  et  Velasquez'!!! 
This  is  so  fearfully  dreadful  you  ought  not  to  mention  it."  To  us, 
it  was  only  fearfully  funny.  Funnier  is  the  fashion  in  which  Austin 
Dobson  mixed  it  up  with  Whistler's  admiration  of  Hogarth,  which 
Dobson  may  have  considered  poaching  on  his  preserves.  On  his 
seventy-fourth  birthday,  The  Morning  Post  sent  a  representative 
to  interview  him,  and  inevitably  Hogarth  came  up  in  the  course 
of  the  interview.  "Whistler  compared  him  with  Velasquez," 
Dobson  said.  "That  perhaps  is  exaggerated  praise,  and  in 
any  case  it  is  not  safe  to  attach  too  much  importance  to 
Whistler's  judgments." 

We  remember  once  M.  Duret  contrasting  Whistler  with  Degas. 
Degas  would  prepare  talk  and  witticisms  beforehand;  if  he  were 
dining,  he  might  wait  till  dinner  was  half  over  before  saying  any 
thing,  but  then  when  his  chance  came  he  would  strike  with  words 
as  sharp  as  a  sword  and  they  would  go  right  through  you.  With 
Whistler,  it  was  spontaneous,  the  wit  of  the  moment.  But  many 
people,  especially  people  who  never  talked  to  him,  declared  it  to 
be  manufactured  and  not  spontaneous,  all  mannerism  and  no 
substance.  "It's  all  don't  you  know  with  Whistler  and  nothing 
else,"  another  dealer  once  said  to  Ernest  Brown.  Many  examples 
are  in  the  Life  and  The  Journal.  A  few  others  we  have  not  yet 
included  which  to  our  knowledge  have  not  been  published,  are 
worth  preserving.  Mrs.  Lynedoch  Moncrieff  was  composing  the 
music  for  some  verses  of  Owen  Meredith's.  Whistler  said  he  would 
like  to  illustrate  them.  She  told  him  they  were  about  the  lark. 
"Charming,"  Whistler  said,  "but  dear  me,  what  can  I  do  when  the 
only  larks  I  know  anything  about  are  larks  on  toast?"  This 
immediately  suggests  his  telegram  to  Madame  Marchesi.  She 
bought  from  him  a  small  marine  and  no  sooner  did  she  get  it  home 
than  she  wired,  "  Whistler,  vous  etes  le  plus  grand  mditre  au  monde." 
As  promptly  he  wired  back,  "Madame,  you  are  the  greatest  lark 
in  the  world  I"  in  which  she  saw  only  the  compliment  and  showed 
it  with  pride  to  her  friends,  and  the  story  got  so  contorted  that 
"Madame,  you  are  the  greatest  nightingale  in  the  world,"  was  a 
version  of  his  telegram  more  usually  quoted.  Wit  of  another  kind 
was  in  his  advice  to  a  man  who  couldn't  sleep  but  walked  up  and 
down  all  night  thinking  of  his  creditors.  "Well,  you  know,"  said 
Whistler,  "better  do  as  I  do — let  your  creditors  do  the  walking  up 

1902]  227 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  down!"  As  characteristic  of  a  still  different  mood  and  manner 
was  a  story  John  Alexander  used  to  tell.  He  was  dining  at  the 
Walter  Gays  and  Whistler  was  there,  though  at  the  other  end  of 
the  table.  Alexander  was  recalling  another  dinner  some  years 
before  where  he  met  Oscar  Wilde.  As  usual  Wilde's  talk  was 
designed  to  lead  up  to  carefully  prepared  witticisms.  In  the  midst 
of  it  the  lady  he  had  taken  in  to  dinner  asked,  "And  how  did  you 
leave  the  weather  in  London,  Mr.  Wilde?"  and  that  was  the  end 
of  the  talk  and  the  witticisms.  Alexander  had  no  idea  that  Whistler 
was  listening  or  even  could  hear,  but,  at  this  point  he  heard  the 
familiar  "Ha!  ha!"  and  Whistler  leaning  over  said  to  him,  "Truly 
a  most  valuable  lady!"  Another  of  Alexander's  stories  should 
have  a  place.  He  was  in  Whistler's  studio  when  Lady  Eden  was 
sitting  for  her  portrait  and  was  very  full  of  a  Turner  some  Lord 
Somebody  wanted  her  to  buy  and  she  was  not  sure  if  it  was  a  real 
Turner,  or  a  sham  Turner,  and  wouldn't  Whistler  come  and  look 
at  it  and  give  her  his  opinion.  "Quite  impossible,  my  dear  Lady 
Eden,"  Whistler  regretted,  "but,  after  all,  isn't  the  distinction  a 
very  subtle  one?" 

Monday ,  January  27th.  Just  as  we  are  asking  each  other,  about 
six  in  the  afternoon,  whether  Whistler  has  gone,  or  whether  any 
minute  he  may  descend  upon  us,  we  hear  the  familiar  knock.  He 
has  come  to  say  good-bye,  as  he  returns  to  Bath  to-morrow.  He 
has  one  piece  of  news,  and  he  produces  an  advertisement  from  the 
Paris  N.  Y.  Herald,  sent  him  by  the  apprentices.  Walter  Sickert 
advertises  an  atelier  in  the  Boulevard  Montparnasse.  "Now  the 
Atelier  Carmen  has  come  to  an  end,  rounded  out  as  it  should  be, 
and  was  always  intended  to  be,  and  everything  all  correct  after 
West  Point  models,  then  the  Walter  Sickerts,  the  followers  who, 
when  they  come  after  the  army,  are  called  bushwhackers,  crowd  in 
and  pick  up  what  they  can.  No  doubt  Sickert  promises  to  carry 
things  much  further  than  Whistler  ever  did,  and  to  reveal,  as  it 
were,  all  the  secrets,  all  the  little  things,  all  the  last  touches, 
Whistler  held  in  reserve.  What?" 

London  has  tired  him  again,  and  he  dozed  off  and  on,  but  talked 
when  awake  with  his  usual  alertness.  He  wants  to  send  some  old 
silver  boxes  to  the  doctor  at  Marseilles  who  was  attentive,  and  to 
the  curator  at  Ajaccio  whose  studio  he  shared,  and,  of  course,  was 
228  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

going  about  it  in  the  most  elaborate,  round-about  fashion,  asking 
at  the  P.  and  O.  S.  S.  office  if  they  would  take  the  parcels  out  in 
their  strong  room  and  have  them  delivered.  The  clerk  said  it 
was  unusual,  but  he  would  telegraph  here,  there,  and  the  other 
place  to  see  if  it  could  be  done.  I  suggested  that,  in  the  mean 
while,  it  would  be  simpler  to  go  to  the  American  Express  people  in 
Waterloo  Place. 

Something  was  said  about  Homer  Martin  who,  we  had  just  been 
told,  once  painted  Whistler's  portrait.  Whistler  said  no,  he  never 
had;  as  had  been  said  about  him,  he  painted  vegetables  not  animals. 
He  delighted  in  Homer  Martin  in  the  old  days.  He  told  the  story 
of  their  going  together  to  Sir  Thomas  Sutherland's,  Chairman  of 
the  P.  O.  Company,  one  Sunday  evening  to  have  "a  bit  of  supper" 
with  him.  "There  we  were,  and  before  supper  there  he  was  show 
ing  us  his  pictures  with  all  solemnity.  The  walls  were  covered. 
He  came  to  a  Calthorp,  above  the  mantelpiece,  a  British  female 
nude.  This,  he  said  slowly  and  pompously,  this  is  Andromeda. 
Homer  Martin  looked  critically  and  attentively  for  a  moment: 
And  I  think  Very  like  Ann  too."  Whistler  laughed,  as  I  have 
seldom  heard  him  laugh.  Homer  Martin's  humour  was  the  sort 
to  appeal  to  him.  He  told  again  the  story  of  Homer  Martin  spend 
ing  the  night  in  the  house  at  Chelsea,  when  Whistler  lived  there 
with  his  mother,  and  in  the  morning  asking  for  the  scissors  for  his 
cuffs,  a  story  I  have  already  written  out.  Martin  used  to  dine  with 
Albert  Moore  and  some  other  men  at  a  little  French  restaurant, 
good  of  its  kind.  "And  I  would  go  sometimes  and  look  them  up 
and  sit  there  talking  with  them  in  the  evening.  But  then,  you 
know,  the  sort  of  Englishman  who  is  entirely  outside  all  these 
things,  but  likes  to  think  he  is  in  it,  began  to  come  too,  and  that 
ruined  it.  He  never  could  make  anything  of  Homer  Martin,  while 
I  was  perpetually  laughing.  There  was  one  wonderful  evening 
when  Martin,  fresh  from  the  Dulwich  Gallery,  grew  more  and 
more  fantastic  as  everybody  looked  more  and  more  bewildered. 
Dullrich's  Gallery  he  called  it.  He  knew  old  Dullrich,  nice  old 
boy,  somehow  pictures  came  to  him.  People  who  had  them  brought 
them  down  to  him,  he  found  them  in  odd  places,  they  were  on  his 
1902]  229 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

walls,  they  overflowed  into  galleries.  Dullrich  would  come  and 
talk  to  him  there,  among  the  pictures,  dear  old  boy.  But  he  got 
old,  feeble.  He  sent  for  Martin.  I'm  going,  he  said,  I'm  going, 
and  he  skipped.  But  there  were  the  pictures  and  the  gallery,  and 
any  one  could  see  them.  This  was  met  with  dead  silence  and 
bewilderment."  I  fancy  half  the  absurdity  was  in  the  way  Martin 
told  it,  as  it  was  certainly  in  the  way  Whistler  repeated  it.  "The 
cuff  story,"  Whistler  said,  "has  been  twisted  round  in  a  version 
I  can  just  trace  to  its  origin.  It  represents  me  as  staying  at  Alma- 
Tadema's  and  as  altogether  untidy  and  slovenly.  I!!  when,  if  I 
had  only  an  old  rag  to  cover  me,  I  should  wear  it  with  such  neatness 
and  propriety — with  the  utmost  distinction."  I  told  him  the  story 
of  Gosse's  horror  when  he  took  Homer  Martin  to  the  Savile  Club, 
where,  late  in  the  evening  Martin  danced  a  breakdown  on  the 
dining-room  table.  "It  is  just  like  them  at  the  Savile,"  he  said, 
"they  were  all  really  butlers,  afraid  of  the  silver  and  china." 
Talking  of  a  woman  novelist  he  met  somewhere,  he  wasn't  sure 
which  it  was.  "I  don't  think  it  was  Mrs.  Humphry  Ward.  Who 
was  it,  you  know,  who  dined  that  evening  at  Heinemann's?  Mary 
Ann  Grand,  wasn't  it?" 

He  has  been  worried  lately  about  the  show  at  the  Luxembourg. 
His  friend,  the  Curator  at  Ajaccio,  wrote  to  Benedite,  proposing 
Whistler's  etchings  and  lithographs,  and  Benedite  wrote  to 
Whistler  that  such  a  show  was  the  desire  of  his  heart.  Whistler 
kept  putting  off  answering  until  there  came  an  irate  letter  from 
Benedite,  saying  he  must  have  everything  in  a  couple  of  months 
or  the  exhibition  would  be  impossible.  Whistler  was  in  despair 
about  getting  the  work  together.  He  consulted  Dunthorne,  who 
said  he  would  be  delighted.  Then  he  came  to  J.,  wanting  to  borrow 
Roullier's  catalogue  of  the  Chicago  exhibition,  which  J.  refused 
outright.  Whistler  said  he  would  never  speak  to  J.  again — to 
refuse  in  this  emergency!  J.  suggested  Colnaghi,  and  peace  was 
made.  Now  Whistler  tells  us  the  result.  MacKay  at  Colnaghi's 
would  do  anything.  "But,  Mr.  Whistler,  you  should  have  let  us 
have  these  things  from  the  first."  "And  my  answer,"  W7histler 
said,  "was  that  I  have  a  little  way  of  remembering,  and  I  remember 
230  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

I  took  my  London  etchings  to  Colnaghi's,  and  they  said  they  would 
consider  the  matter.  I  left  the  prints,  and,  after  a  little,  not  hear 
ing,  went  to  ask  what  they  were  going  to  do.  We  are  sorry,  but 
we  find  we  cannot  do  anything,  was  the  answer.  They  are  not 
exactly  the  things  for  us.  In  fact,  they  are  not  dogs  by  Landseer. 
Ha,  ha!  I  see,"  said  Whistler. 

On  the  inexhaustible  Boer  question,  he  told  us  that  when  Mrs. 
Philip,  who  naturally  has  no  sympathy  with  his  views,  talks  to 
him  on  the  subject,  he  tells  her,  as  he  told  Miss  Hensman,  "You 
would  have  made  a  very  good  Boer,  Ma'am."  .A  story  he  repeated 
with  delight  is  of  the  American  girl  at  the  Tower,  who,  when 
shown  a  gun  the  guide  said  was  captured  at  Bunker  Hill,  looked 
at  it,  and  then,  "Well,  you  took  the  gun,  but  I  reckon  we  kept 
the  hill." 

Whistler's  knock  was  as  characteristic  as  everything  else  about 
him.  In  London  in  those  days,  everybody  with  a  front  door,  had 
a  knocker  on  it  as  well  as  a  bell — a  bell  that  pulled  and  a  knocker 
that  knocked.  Whistler  gave  two  violent  thumps  with  the  knocker, 
like  the  British  postman  for  whose  benefit  it  was  there,  and  then 
gave  a  violent  pull  at  the  bell,  and  this  he  always  did  wherever 
he  went.  It  was  a  warning  and  an  announcement,  more  than  once 
taken  advantage  of  in  getting  "the  enemies,"  if  they  happened  to 
be  there,  out  of  the  way.  "Look  out  for  the  knock  that  shall 
announce"  he  would  write  to  prepare  us  for  his  coming,  and  it 
made  its  announcement  not  only  to  us,  but  to  everyone  in  the 
Buckingham  Street  house,  from  the  housekeeper  on  the  ground 
floor  to  our  neighbour  on  the  top.  And  yet,  he  would  express  the 
most  innocent  surprise  at  the  marvellous  detective  system  by 
which  we  were  kept  informed  of  his  visits  when,  by  rare  chance, 
he  found  nobody  in  our  flat,  not  even  Augustine,  to  open  the  door. 
In  1901  Whistler,  finding  he  was  unable  to  visit  the  Academic, 
wrote  his  classic  farewell  from  Ajaccio  to  the  students  and  the 
school  was  closed.  Now,  new  ventures  were  rising  up  out  of  its 
ashes.  Of  Whistler's  followers,  these  "bushwhackers,"  Theodore 
Roussel  once  said  to  us  that  they  always  made  him  think  of  the 
soldier  to  whom  Napoleon  once  spoke.  "He  spoke  to  me,"  he 
bragged  in  barracks.  "What  did  he  say?"  his  comrades  asked. 
"I  called  'Halte!'  Napoleon  said,  'Taisez-vous  Imbecile!'" 
1902]  231 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Sir  Thomas  Sutherland,  successful  business  man.  President  of  the 
P.  and  O.  Steamship  Company,  staunch  friend  to  Whistler  through 
the  bankruptcy,  was  a  typical  Briton  in  his  attitude  towards  art. 
He  was  interested  in  Whistler  to  the  end  though  they  seldom  met 
in  later  years.  He  was  willing  to  tell  us  all  he  could  of  the  earlier 
days  of  their  friendship.  But  in  his  long  talk  with  E.  his  attitude 
towards  Whistler  was  one  of  condescension,  of  the  prosperous  man 
of  affairs  to  the  artist  whose  work  he  does  not  understand.  He 
toldE.:— 

November  1st,  1906.  After  he  married  in  1880,  he  went  less  into 
Bohemia,  he  said,  he  sold  the  old  furniture,  the  blue-and-white 
china,  the  pictures — among  them  two  by  Whistler — with  which 
his  house  as  bachelor  had  been  filled,  and  so,  of  course,  was  less 
intimate  with  Whistler.  As  a  bachelor  he  had  gone  to  the  Sunday 
breakfasts  —  delightful  —  eccentric  —  partly  American  —  partly 
French — not  much  to  eat — but  Whistler  charming  and  carrying 
it  off  as  if  it  were  a  feast.  And  the  dinners  were  excellent,  if 
original — really,  he  didn't  know  how  Whistler  managed  them.  And 
he  went  on  to  explain  further  that  Whistler  did  not  send  often  to 
regular  exhibitions  because  he  was  conscious  of  his  weakness  and 
did  not  care  to  compete  with  legitimate  art — such  art  as  the  art 
of  Millais.  Altogether,  he  spoke  of  Whistler  amiably,  but  with 
condescending  amiability  as  if  he  were  an  amusing  child  or  an 
eccentric  American,  and  as  if  it  was  most  kind  on  his  own  part 
to  be  amused:  the  British  attitude,  the  attitude  that  hurt 
Whistler,  that  he  had  "to  laugh  away,"  though  he  never  knew 
it  was  Sutherland's. 

The  reference  to  Sutherland's  collection  suggests  three  other  visits 
made  by  Whistler  to  great  private  collections.  One  day  a  rich 
amateur  collector  invited  him  to  go  through  his  gallery.  Whistler 
went  through  it  all  and  never  opened  his  mouth  until,  at  the  front 
door,  the  collectoi  got  up  courage  enough  to  ask  him  what  he 
thought  of  the  collection.  "There  is  no  excuse  for  it,"  said 
Whistler,  and,  before  the  collector  could  recover,  he  walked  out 
and  slammed  the  door  to  after  him.  Another  time  he  was  inveigled 
into  going  to  see  another  collection,  and  the  collector  kept  hinting, 
as  they  passed  through  each  room,  that  he  proposed  to  make  a 
232  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

gift  of  it  after  his  death.  "And  to  whom  do  you  think  I  should  give 
it,  Mr.  Whistler?"  he  asked  at  last.  "To  an  asylum  for  the  blind," 
was  the  reply.  When  he  was  in  The  Hague  later  in  1902,  he  visited 
Mesdag  with  the  Sauters  and  Bruckman,  a  Dutch  artist  who  lives 
in  London.  In  the  studio  into  which  Mesdag  led  them  to  see  his 
own  work,  Whistler  seemed  to  disappear,  while  the  others  went 
from  one  picture  to  the  next,  saying  what  they  could.  When  they 
reached  the  last  picture,  Whistler  seemed  to  reappear,  murmuring 
something  about  a  fine  sky  and  now  should  they  not  be  shown 
Mesdag's  collection  of  the  Masters?  Bruckman,  our  reporter  of 
this  occasion,  finished  the  story  with  the  lunch  afterwards  at  the 
Cafe  Riche,  so  good  that  Whistler  summoned  the  manager  to  tell 
him  so,  which  is  characteristic.  As  they  were  leaving,  a  waiter 
asked  Bruckman  who  the  gentleman  was,  the  manager  wished  to 
know.  Bruckman  refused  to  give  Whistler's  name.  The  manager 
arrived.  He  wanted  to  know  only  for  his  own  pleasure,  he  could 
see  the  gentleman  who  so  well  liked  his  restaurant  was  one  of 
distinction,  and  he  was  honoured.  Then  Bruckman  told  him.  The 
next  day  The  Hague  papers  published  a  note  to  say  that  the  dis 
tinguished  artist  Whistler  had  been  lunching  at  the  Cafe  Riche 
and  had  expressed  his  great  approval — a  regular  puff. 
We  do  not  know  what  the  little  restaurant  was  where  Whistler 
went  to  meet  Homer  Martin  and  Albert  Moore,  perhaps  Pagani's 
in  the  days  of  its  sanded  floor  and  good  spaghetti — not  the  sort  of 
stuff  Americans  devour — and  low  prices.  Both  were  men  Whistler 
sincerely  liked,  so  sincerely  that  it  was  a  regret  to  us  to  hear  that, 
though  there  was  no  break  in  the  friendship  with  Homer  Martin, 
a  coolness  sprang  up  in  the  end  between  him  and  Albert  Moore. 
T.  R.  Way  thought  this  was  because  Albert  Moore  criticised  The 
Three  Girls,  and  Whistler  immediately  wiped  it  out,  and  could 
never  paint  it  again  as  well.  But  Whistler  did  not  object  to  criti 
cism  from  friends,  he  rubbed  out  and  repainted  this  canvas  many 
times,  and  it  was  some  years  after  that  Albert  Moore  was  the  one 
artist  who  stood  by  him  in  the  Ruskin  case.  A  more  plausible 
reason  we  have  from  Mr.  Walter  Dowdeswell.  At  a  dinner,  old 
Mr.  Dowdeswell  gave  to  Albert  Moore  and  Whistler  at  the  Cafe 
Royal,  Albert  Moore  told  them  that  he  was  painting  a  group  of 
flying  figures,  and  in  order  to  get  the  right  movement  in  the 
draperies  he  had  used  fans  and  bellows,  and  this  gave  his  wretched 
model  pneumonia,  and  she  died.  "Ha!  ha!"  laughed  Whistler, 
"and  this  is  how  you  make  consumption!"  Albert  Moore  flew 
into  a  temper,  and  the  quarrel  could  never  be  patched  up.  A  pity. 
1902]  233 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Friday,  March  28th,  1902.  All  this  time,  we  have  heard  that 
Whistler  is  in  town,  but  he  wishes  no  one  to  know  it.  He  is  envel 
oped  in  mystery — will  see  no  one.  He  answers  no  letters.  Not 
even  Heinemann  is  admitted.  Sauter  is  once,  and  there  is  a  visit 
from  Whistler  to  Sauter — to  be  revealed  to  no  one — when  the 
Boer  agitation  is  at  its  height,  because  Whistler  wants  to  know  how 
things  are  going  and,  of  course,  the  subject  cannot  be  mentioned 
in  the  presence  of  "the  Ladies."  At  last  we  write  that  J.  is  going 
to  Italy  and  Whistler  asks  him  to  come  to  the  studio.  He  is  living 
at  Tite  Street.  J.  spends  the  whole  afternoon  with  him,  but  does 
not  report  anything  to  be  specially  noted. 

"The  Ladies"  were  his  mother-in-law,  Mrs.  Birnie  Philip,  and  the 
numerous  sisters-in-law,  always  coming  and  going,  fluttering  about 
him.  After  his  return  from  Bath,  they  literally  swallowed  him  up 
for  a  few  weeks. 

Sunday,  April  20th.  As  Whistler  is  not  going  anywhere  in  the 
evening  yet,  asked  him  to  lunch  with  Miss  Philip.  Not  knowing 
until  the  last  minute  whether  he  could  come  or  not,  had  time  only 
to  send  round  for  Harrison  Rhodes.  Whistler  in  his  best  form, 
as  he  so  often  is  when  his  audience  is  small  and  sympathetic.  Has 
just  moved  into  Ashbee's  house  in  Cheyne  Walk,  which  he  has 
taken  for  a  couple  of  years.  He  describes  it  as  "The  whole,  you 
know,  a  successful  example  of  the  disastrous  effect  of  art  upon  the 
British  middle  classes.  When  I  look  at  the  copper  front  door  and 
all  the  little  odd  decorative  touches  throughout  the  house,  I  ask 
myself  what  I  am  doing  there,  anyhow?  But  the  studio  is  fine, 
I  have  decorated  it  for  myself,  gone  back  to  the  old  scheme  of 
grey."  Then  he  got  launched,  somehow,  on  West  Point  and  after 
lunch  went  over  the  old  familiar  ground,  with  that  ever  fresh 
enthusiasm  so  marvellous  in  him,  to  Rhodes,  while  Miss  Philip 
talked  to  me. 

Thursday,  April  24-th.  Went  with  Rhodes  to  take  tea  in  Whistler's 
studio.  No  one  else  but  Miss  Philip.  At  first  I  thought  Whistler 
would  show  nothing,  but  after  a  little  while  he  began  to  bring  out 
picture  after  picture:  the  portrait  of  an  American  who  had  written 
234  [1902 


RICHARD  A.  CANPIBLD 

His  Reverence 
Showing  Whistler  Frame  Finally  Adopted  by  Him  for  His  Oils 

OIL 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

to  ask  if  Whistler  would  paint  his  portrait  in  some  unusually  short 
time.  Whistler  answered,  "Well — I  must  see  you  first — and — 
when  he  came  I  was  so  pleased  with  him,  I  went  right  to  work." 
It  is  a  small  portrait,  just  the  bust — the  face,  clean-shaven,  round, 
ugly  but  full  of  shrewd  character,  typically  American.  Then,  a 
portrait  of  Miss  Philip;  a  painting  of  his  small  model,  a  beautiful 
nude — just  the  figure  standing  on  vaguely  suggested  shore;  the 
pastels  I  have  seen.  He  seemed  anxious  to  impress  upon  Rhodes, 
above  all,  the  difference  between  what  is  "going  on"  in  his  studio 
and  others  nowadays.  "In  my  pictures  there  is  no  cleverness, 
no  brush-marks,  nothing  to  astonish  and  bewilder,  but  simply  a 
gradual,  more  perfect  growth  of  beauty — it  is  this  beauty  my 
canvases  reveal,  not  the  way  it  is  obtained." 

This  was  the  beginning  of  the  portrait  of  Richard  A.  Canfield, 
gambler  and  Harvard  graduate,  who  spent  his  time  between 
quoting  Horace,  cleaning  out  young  millionaires,  and  patronizing 
painters  with  the  proceeds.  He  was  forced  to  skip  from  New  York, 
and  in  London  he  fastened  himself  on  to  Whistler  and  became  a 
very  good  patron,  if  an  odious  character. 

Saturday ,  May  ijth.  Came  back  from  Paris  and  arrived  home  to 
find  Whistler  waiting  for  me.  He  had  come  just  as  Augustine  was 
starting  to  meet  me  and  she  left  him  there.  My  train  was  late, 
the  customs  slow,  and  when  we  finally  got  to  the  flat,  he  was 
opening  the  door  for  the  postman.  He  wore  a  light  overcoat,  but 
he  was  crouching  over  the  fire — the  rain  had  begun  and  he  was  sure 
he  was  catching  cold.  He  came,  I  think,  to  talk  over  the  Rodin 
dinner  at  the  Cafe  Royal  of  two  nights  before.  He  did  not  go,  he  is 
still  afraid  to  venture  out  in  the  evening,  but  he  wrote  a  letter 
which  afterwards  figured  in  all  the  papers.  "Rodin  was  break 
fasting  with  me  today,  and  Tweed,  the  sculptor  who  has  him  in 
charge,  and  Lanteri  from  South  Kensington.  It  was  all  very 
charming,  Rodin  distinguished  in  every  way,  the  breakfast  very 
elegant,  but,  well,  you  know,  you  will  understand — but — of  course, 
it  is  something  I  do  not  want  repeated,  for  others  might  not 
understand.  Naturally,  before  they  came,  I  put  all  my  work  out 
1902]  235 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

of  sight — canvases  up  against  the  wall  with  their  backs  turned, 
nothing  about.  But  you  know  never  once,  not  even  after  break 
fast,  did  Rodin  ask  to  see  anything.  Not  that  I  wanted  to  show 
him  anything,  I  needn't  tell  you,  but  in  a  man  so  distinguished  it 
seemed  a  curious  want  of — well,  of  what  West  Point  would  have 
demanded  under  the  circumstances."  I  could  see  he  was  hurt, 
though  had  it  been  a  lesser  man  than  Rodin,  he  would  not  have 
thought  of  it  twice.  "Well,  you  know,  Rodin's  head  is  a  trifle 
turned  by  this  sudden  enthusiasm.  Now  he  is  going  down  to 
Budapest  to  superintend,  as  it  were,  his  own  show  there."  Then 
he  told  me,  what  I  had  not  yet  heard,  the  wild  excitement  at  the 
Cafe  Royal,  afterwards  the  Slade  students  taking  the  horses  out 
of  the  carriage  and  dragging  it,  with  Tadema  inside  by  Rodin's 
side,  and  Sargent  on  the  box,  to  the  Arts  Club. 
And  the  rain  coming  on,  he  began  to  worry  at  finding  himself  so 
far  from  home,  and  Augustine  made  him  a  grog,  and  I  lent  him 
Joseph's  overcoat  which  he  put  on  over  his  own,  and  he  went  off 
in  a  four-wheeler. 

Others,  besides  Whistler,  thought  Rodin's  head  a  little  turned  by 
the  attention  he  received  in  London.  He  might  have  stood  it 
from  artists  and  students.  But  society  took  him  up.  He  usually 
stayed  with  Lady  Warwick  or  Mrs.  Charles  Hunter,  and  he  was 
much  entertained  and  lionized.  He  seemed  so  pleased  at  getting 
into  society  that  he  allowed  the  English  to  treat  his  sculpture  as 
they  chose.  He  was  rightly  particular  about  the  way  his  work  was 
shown.  For  instance,  he  always  insisted  to  J.  that  his  work  should 
be  placed  in  the  light  of  nature,  en  plein  air.  He  carried  this  out 
in  his  exhibition  in  Paris  in  1900,  and  he  even  wanted  later  the 
roof  taken  off  the  sculpture  hall  of  the  New  Gallery  in  Regent 
Street  where  the  International  Exhibitions  were  held.  Therefore, 
his  acceptance  of  the  British  treatment  of  his  Burghers  of  Calais 
is  a  proof  of  how  badly  his  head  was  turned.  The  group  in  his 
studio  or  in  exhibitions,  and  when  finally  set  up  at  Calais,  was 
placed  on  a  pedestal  about  a  foot  or  so  high,  in  order  that  one 
could  see  the  whole  composition  and  the  chained  feet  of  the  figures. 
But  some  brilliant  genius  in  England  conceived  the  idea  of  sticking 
it  upon  a  pedestal  copied  from  the  Colleoni  in  Venice,  high  in  the 
air,  so  cutting  off  the  feet  and  ruining  the  design.  MacColl  told 
236  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

us  Rodin  was  delighted  with  it.  Probably  the  idea  was  MacColl's. 
The  story  of  Rodin's  breakfast  with  Whistler  went  the  usual  rounds 
of  everything  concerning  Whistler,  and  we  had  another  version 
from  Mrs.  Simpson,  whose  husband  owns  Pellegrini's  large,  life- 
size  caricature  of  Whistler.  In  this  version,  the  visit  to  Whistler 
of  Rodin  and  another  sculptor  was  in  Paris.  Whistler  showed  them 
many  pictures  until  the  other  sculptor  said  it  was  time  to  go  to 
breakfast.  Rodin  felt  it  an  insult  to  think  of  breakfast  when 
looking  at  Whistler's  work,  but  he  was  the  sculptor's  guest  and  he 
had  to  go.  The  next  time  he  called  on  Whistler,  he  was  received 
in  the  drawing-room,  Whistler  said  nothing  of  work  and  turned  a 
musical  box  from  beginning  to  end  of  the  visit.  A  curious  medley 
this.  That  Rodin  went  on  another  occasion  to  see  Whistler  we 
know — when  Whistler's  studio  was  in  the  Fulham  Road,  and 
Whistler  wrote  to  Rodin  of  his  pleasure  in  the  visit.  Rodin  may 
also  have  gone  in  Paris,  but  Whistler's  studio  there  was  not  near 
his  house  or  flat  or  drawing-room,  though  the  musical  box  is  most 
likely  the  gramophone  he  loved  and  set  going  with  inexhaustible 
joy  for  every  sympathetic  visitor.  One  record  he  never  tired  of 
gave  an  American  quack's  patter  in  praise  of  a  patent  drug, 
every  sentence  ending  with  "It  costs  a  little  more,  but  what  of 
that?"  He  turned  it  on  one  afternoon  when  the  George  Vander- 
bilts  and  Heinemann  were  in  the  studio.  He  and  Heinemann  were 
to  dine  with  the  Vanderbilts  at  Foyot's  that  evening.  But  after 
they  had  gone  and  before  he  left  the  studio,  a  note  came  from  Mrs. 
Vanderbilt  saying,  would  he  mind  if  they  decided  for  Voisin's 
instead,  finishing,  "It  costs  a  little  more,  but  what  of  that?" 
which,  coming  from  a  Vanderbilt,  struck  him  as  even  more  humour 
ous  than  in  the  mouth  of  the  quack. 

Sunday,  May  2$th.  Whistler  and  Miss  Philip,  and  the  Sauters 
to  breakfast.  Rather  a  dull  occasion.  Whistler  evidently  tired, 
the  Sauters  as  they  always  are  when  he  is  present,  subdued,  and 
as  Miss  Philip  was  with  him  there  was  no  chance  to  talk  of  the 
Boers.  He  was  in  a  state  of  indignation  with  Ashbee.  "No 
sooner  did  I  get  into  the  house  than  building  has  begun  on  the 
vacant  lot  next  door.  The  house  is  being  put  up  by  Ashbee  him 
self  who,  no  doubt,  went  away  to  get  out  of  the  annoyance.  It 
is  knock,  knock,  knock  all  day  long."  He  was  full  of  the  gossip 
that  a  knighthood  for  Sargent  was  to  be  included  among  the 
Birthday  honours — "also,  will  not  Abbey  have  to  be  knighted  for 
the  Coronation  picture  ?  And  what  of  their  American  citizenship  ? " 
1902]  237 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

On  several  occasions,  including  the  King's  birthday,  a  whole 
basketful  of  titles  and  decorations  is  emptied  out  over  the  most 
unexpected  crowd  in  England.  None,  however,  came  Whistler's 
way.  There  is  no  question  of  giving  up  citizenship.  They  have 
been  showered  promiscuously  upon,  and  accepted  by  American 
officers  and  business  men  whom  nobody  knew,  nor  what  they  have 
done,  and  whose  names  have  never  been  heard  of  since.  Another 
time,  the  same  rumour  about  Sargent  made  Whistler  eager 
to  know  if  Sargent  had  become  an  Englishman  because  of 
much  temptation? 

Sunday,  June  ist.  Whistler  came  to  lunch  to  meet  Mrs.  Whitman 
and  Miss  Tuckerman.  He  looked  tired  out  when  he  came,  worse 
than  I  have  seen  him  look  for  a  long  time.  The  Ashbee  business 
has  got  on  his  nerves.  And  no  wonder,  the  knocking  goes  on  all 
day.  There  are  times  when  in  the  studio  you  can't  hear  yourself 
speak.  He  told  the  whole  story  to  Mrs.  Whitman  and  Miss 
Tuckerman — he  described  the  house  with  its  decorations  and  ex 
plained  the  trick  he  thinks  Ashbee  has  played.  He  has  put  the 
matter  into  the  hands  of  Webb  and  hopes  for  legal  redress — • 
though  I  don't  see  that  there  is  any  chance  of  it.  But  it  is  evident 
that  the  constant  knocking  and  indignation  with  Ashbee  are  telling 
on  his  nerves  and  his  health.  There  was  still  time  for  much 
talk  about  the  Boers,  and  he  summed  up  the  whole  campaign  for 
the  benefit  of  his  new  audience. 

This  house,  to  which  there  have  been  several  references,  was  No.  74 
Cheyne  Walk,  into  which  he  moved  in  April.  There  was  no  ques 
tion  that  his  health  was  failing  and  that  he  was  beginning  to  feel 
the  discomfort  of  living  in  a  hotel  and  of  having  a  studio  so  far 
from  where  he  lived.  But  it  is  incredible  in  the  first  place  that  the 
Ashbee  house  was  chosen  for  him,  and,  in  the  second,  that  he  was 
not  urged  to  leave  it  as  soon  as  the  building  operations  next  door 
began.  It  had  a  great  deal  to  do  with  shortening  his  life.  It  was 
a  ridiculous  place  anyway,  the  studio  on  the  ground  floor,  which 
was  damp,  the  dining  and  bed  rooms  at  the  top  where  he  had  to 
climb  to  eat  and  to  sleep  until  the  Doctor  stopped  him.  After 
that  he  slept  in  a  front  room  on  a  level  with  the  street — the  model's 
dressing  room — only  one  window  in  it,  with  panes  so  small  you 
could  hardly  look  out  of  it — more  like  a  prison  cell  than  a  bedroom. 
The  whole  affair  was  tragic. 
238  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

Thursday,  June  I2th.  Whistler  came  to  dinner  to  meet  Harrison 
Morris  and  his  wife.  Sauter  came  too.  I  thought  they  would  want 
to  talk  about  the  International,  but  the  talk  was  chiefly  of  the 
Boers.  Whistler  cannot  resist  a  new  and  sympathetic  audience, 
and  the  amazing  part  of  it  is  that,  often  as  I  have  heard  him  on  the 
subject,  I  always  listen  with  renewed  zest.  He  began  to  talk  of 
Chase,  who  is  now  with  the  Morrises  over  here.  I  felt  it  was 
right  to  let  him  know  that  Chase  was  their  friend,  but  I  think  the 
fact  only  made  him  the  more  anxious  to  go  on.  "Well,  you  know, 
Chase  seems  to  think  it  necessary  to  go  through  the  country 
lecturing  about  me  and  telling  little  anecdotes — all  at  second  hand." 
But  the  Boers  monopolized  the  evening. 

This  was  the  last  evening  Whistler  dined  at  Buckingham  Street. 
Mrs.  Morris  has  kindly  sent  us,  and  allowed  us  to  use,  the  note 
she  made  of  this  evening  from  her  point  of  view.  We  give  it  because 
it  shows  how  he  impressed  people  who  could  understand,  especially 
the  first  time  they  met  him.  We  had  listened  with  never  dimin 
ishing  amusement  to  his  talk  about  the  Boers,  but  E.  had  ceased 
to  make  detailed  notes  of  it  and  many  she  did  make  were  used  in 
the  Life.  But  it  was  all  fresh  to  Mrs.  Morris  and  stimulating  in 
its  freshness.  Besides,  E.'s  notes  were  usually  fullest  when  he 
dined  alone  with  us.  When  there  was  a  party  she  was  often  too 
preoccupied  with  others  to  hear  his  talk. 

"June  I2th,  1902.     I  dined  with  Mr.  Whistler  at  Mrs.  Joseph 

Pennell's   in   London.      Mr.   Morris   and   Mr.  Sauter^  were   the 

other  guests. 

"Whistler  arrived  very  late,  and  kept  us  waiting  for  him  at  every 

course.     He  had  a  mustache  and  small  imperial,  his  lower  jaw 

protruded,  and  his  white  lock  was  noticeable.    His  eyes  were  grey, 

sharp  and  bloodshot. 

"He  was  profoundly  conscious  of  being  the  only  thing  in  the  world 

worth  attention,  so,  as  there  was  no  critical  influence  present,  he 

genially  expanded.    He  mumbled,  and  gave  parts  of  half  a  dozen 

sentences  instead  of  one  clear  sentence,  in  a  piercing  treble  voice. 

"He  said,  'The  well-meaning  person  is  the  worst  kind.' 

"He  did  not  allow  that  a  nigger  could  ever  be  an  equal;  said  'he 

1902]  239 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

is  something  between  an  ape  and  a  man.'  When  we  told  him  that 
we  associate  with  them,  he  spread  out  his  hands,  smiling  and  say 
ing,  *  Well,  you  know,  it  depends  upon  the  season  of  the  year  I* 
"When  he  was  telling  of  something  unpleasant  happening,  I 
asked  *  Was  it  in  London?'  And  he  instantly  shot  out  the  words, 
'Where  else?' 

"He  spoke  of  Arthur  J.  Eddy's  knowledge,  and  I,  supposing  he 
had  forgotten  my  existence,  remarked,  'It's  only  cleverness.'  He 
turned  square  round  upon  me,  saying  impressively,  'Very  true. 
When  a  lady  chooses  to  open  her  mouth,  she  always  says  what's 
true.  That  is  so.  It  is  cleverness.' 

"He  said,  'The  English  employ  insolence  to  cover  emptiness.' 
"He  called  Wm.  M.  Chase  'an  American  bounder.' 
"Eddy  is  more  of  a  gentleman,  because  he  lectured  about  him  as 
an  outsider;  but  Chase  lectured  about  him  as  an  intimate,  a  con 
frere,  'while  the  piano  played  an  accompaniment.'     Eddy  ought 
to  lecture  about  wine,  which  he  knows  about,  instead  of  'the  lost 
art  of  the  beautiful.' 

"  Whistler  was  delighted  with  Harrison's  story  of  Buller  as  'whipped 
cream.'    He  said,  'The  entire  English  army  has  been  captured.' 
"Whistler  was  absolutely  pro-Boer.    He  thought  the  English  were 
too  dumb  and  too  stuck-up  to  know  when  they  were  beaten  and 
when  they  were  ridiculous.    Young  men  who  know  nothing  about 
tactics,  are  made  officers  in  the  field.     Their  athletic  training 
enabled  them  to  run  twenty  miles  away  from  the  .Boers. 
"He  thought  the  training  at  West  Point  absolutely  perfect,  but 
in  danger  of  being  ruined:    because  wherever  there  is  perfection, 
decay  must  begin.    As  soon  as  the  West-Pointers  become  conscious 
of  their  isolation,  then  the  merit  of  the  place  is  lost,  never  to  return. 
He  remembered  'Joe  Wheeler'  and  Professor  Coppee  there. 
"He  thought  his  country,  America,   had  done  some  very  fine 
things  and  some  very  stupid  ones.     She  should  have  fought  with 
the  Boers.     It  would  have  been  courteous  to  them — but  mainly 
the  Americans,  with  very  little  trouble,  would  have  stuck  their 
own  cap  full  of  feathers. 
"He  was  down  on  American  journalism. 
240  [1902 


ARTHUR  J.  EDDY 

OIL 
In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Arthur  J.  Eddy 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

"He  considered  the  preparations  for  the  coronation  beneath  con 
tempt;  the  street  decorations  so  bad  that  *a  two-year  old  child 
would  not  put  them  on  its  doll.' 

"When  asked  of  George  Moore,  he  said  ' George  Moore?    George 
Moore  does  not  exist.    He  died  many  years  ago!' 
"He  said  'One  cannot  be  in  London  without  one's  lawyer.'    When 
asked  if  he'd  have  whiskey,  he  replied,  'Well,  if  there's  nothing 
else,  what's  one  to  do?' 

"He  sat  on  my  right,  and  I  observed  that  his  profile  was  like  the 
profile  in  the  portrait  of  his  mother.  He  was  small,  thin,  grey, 
pink-cheeked,  with  crooked  tie,  thin  ring  on  little  finger,  and  little 
slippers.  When  I  said  I  had  not  seen  the  famous  eye-glass,  he 
genially  put  it  on. 

"He  said  that  because  Alma-Tadema  became  an  Englishman,  the 
English  have  to  protect  all  the  abominable  things  he  did. 
"When  I  mentioned  that  I  was  treasuring  some  pictures  of  him 
by  Menpes,  he  expressed  incredulity  of  the  whole  business,  but 
finally  said  'I  believe  there  was  a  sort  of  person — I  mean  to  say, 
a  creature,  of  that  name.  But  when  one  allows  any  one  to  approach 
him,  one  naturally  supposes  that  he  is  a  gentleman.  Perhaps  the 
scoundrel  did  take  the  pictures.' 

"As  he  left,  I  said,  'I  am  proud  to  have  met  you!  and  I  shall  keep 
the  Menpes  pictures,  in  spite  of  you ! '  which  seemed  to  tickle  him." 

Tuesday,  June  I'jih.  Tonight  dined  with  Whistler  at  the  Ashbee 
house  in  Cheyne  Walk.  Mrs.  and  Miss  Philip  there .  and  Mr. 
Freer.  We  did  not  sit  down  till  about  half  past  eight,  or  later  and 
dinner  was  not  over  much  before  eleven,  although  it  was  quite 
simple.  But  Whistler  had  a  bottle  of  special  Burgundy  which  he 
had  bought  from,  of  all  people,  the  French  barber  in  Regent  Street 
to  whom  he  goes.  It  was  in  its  cradle  and  the  cork  had  to  be  drawn, 
and  Mr.  Freer  had  to  help,  and  it  was  a  matter  of  almost  half  an 
hour.  And  then  he  was  showing  Mr.  Freer  his  silver  and  his  blue- 
and-white,  about  which,  Mr.  Freer,  who  collects  china,  knew  all 
the  correct  facts.  Mr.  Freer,  in  a  shop  where  they  sell  antiquities 
lately  came  across  a  Chinese  bed,  a  wonderful  affair,  that  had 

1902]  241 

16 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

belonged  to  Whistler.  Whistler  said  he  had  it  in  the  old  Cheyne 
Walk  house,  but  he  got  interested  in  other  things  and  for  some 
reason,  he  didn't  exactly  rernember  why,  he  replaced  it  with  some 
thing  else.  I  wondered  whether  it  was  one  of  the  things  that  went 
at  the  time  of  the  bankruptcy.  After  dinner,  before  the  men 
joined  us,  Miss  Philip  told  me  the  knocking  was  something  fearful 
and  put  him  in  the  most  violent  rage,  the  thing  above  all  others 
the  Doctor  cautioned  them  must  be  avoided.  Mr.  Freer  drove 
me  home.  On  the  way,  he  told  me  Whistler  had  asked  him  to  look 
up  his  pictures  and  find  out  where  they  were  for  him. 

We  might  as  well  say  here  that  our  story,  printed  in  the  Life 
about  the  dinner  Whistler  gave  at  the  Cafe  Royal  to  which  Freer 
came  mortally  offended  him.  He  not  only  never  would  meet  us 
afterwards,  but  he  did  everything  he  could  to  prevent  our  seeing 
his  Whistlers.  This  kind  of  opposition  was  not  reserved  for  us 
alone.  He  treated  Mr.  Kennedy,  when  he  was  preparing  the 
Grolier  Catalogue  in  the  same  unreasonable  fashion.  In  fact, 
Freer's  personal  likes  and  dislikes  came  near  outweighing  his 
interest  in  art  and  at  times  did  Whistler's  memory  a  good  deal  of 
harm.  Canfield,  who,  as  we  have  said,  Freer  introduced  to  Whistler, 
was  not  altogether  unlike  him.  Another  example  of  Freer's 
curious  prejudices  occurred  at  the  first  meeting  called  in  London 
at  the  National  Club  to  devise  schemes  and  raise  money  for  a 
Whistler  Memorial.  Freer,  who  had  been  invited  to  attend,  calmly 
announced  that  he  would  either  put  up  the  Memorial  with  his 
own  money  or  it  would  not  go  up — the  attitude  too  often  of  the 
American  patron  of  art.  He  was  promptly  told  that,  though  the 
Committee  would  be  glad  to  accept  his  money,  the  monument 
would  be  designed  and  erected  as  they  wanted,  and  not  as  he 
demanded.  Freer,  after  this,  devoted  himself  to  the  West  Point 
Memorial  by  St.  Gaudens.  We  might  also  state  that  the  money 
necessary  to  erect  the  Memorial  (See  Appendix)  and  the  American 
replica  was  all  collected.  It  was  not  erected  simply  because  Rodin, 
after  the  site  too  had  been  secured,  never  finished  his  work,  and 
the  scheme  which  his  executor  M.  Benedite  endeavoured  to  force 
in  marble,  when  a  bronze  was  commissioned,  was  rejected  by  the 
Committee  as  unworthy  of  Rodin  and  unworthy  of  Whistler. 
So  much  has  been  said  about  Whistler's  always  being  late  that  we 
might  give  one  reason  for  it,  which  was  that  he  hated  the  stupid 
society  fashion  of  breaking  up  a  dinner  party  in  the  middle  of  the 
242  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

evening.  It  is  rare  in  this  country  that  people  dine  at  a  civilized 
hour.  You  are  asked  to  dinner  at  six  or  seven  o'clock.  The  dinner 
is  rushed  through  as  fast  as  possible,  everybody  cackling  at  once. 
There  is  never  any  conversation,  and  as  soon  as  possible  the  whole 
crowd  rush  off  home  or  somewhere  else.  Whistler  loved  to  potter 
about  in  the  studio,  to  take  his  time  getting  dressed,  to  have  his 
dinner  never  before  eight  except  when  he  came  to  us,  to  sit  over  it, 
to  dominate  the  talk,  then  to  linger  over  his  coffee  and  cognac, 
to  talk  again  until  he  was  tired,  and  this  was  usually  near  mid 
night.  It  was  a  civilized  and  intellectual  form  of  existence  which 
has  disappeared  from  the  earth.  Whistler  would  dine  only  with 
people  who  interested  him  and  who  understood  him.  On  the 
rare  occasions  when  he  accepted  an  invitation  from  those  who 
did  not,  he  took  advantage  of  his  happy  faculty  of  sleeping,  or  he 
could  be  absolutely  silent.  He  would  never  go  again  to  such  a 
house,  and  indeed  he  would  not  be  asked.  But  this  seldom  hap 
pened.  He  never  showed  off  at  any  time.  He  never  could  be  made 
to  show  off.  He  was  simply  himself.  There  was  nothing  John 
sonian  about  him.  He  never  thundered  when  he  wanted  to  be 
heard.  There  was  just  his  "Ha!  ha!"  and  everybody  stopped 
talking  and  listened.  Often  everybody  stopped  eating  too. 
Whistler  probably  asked  Freer  to  look  up  his  pictures  because  for 
months  he  had  been  worried  and  annoyed  by  the  disappearance  of 
much  work  from  the  studio.  He  had  lost  things  before,  but  never 
in  such  numbers.  It  was  doubly  annoying  when  the  missing  work 
began  to  reappear  for  sale  in  Paris  shops  or  other  places  where  it 
had  got  without  his  knowledge.  The  apprentices  had  come  upon 
many  lithographs  where  he  was  surprised  any  should  be  found, 
paintings  had  turned  up  where  they  had  no  business  to  be,  and 
"the  picture  robbery"  as  he  termed  it,  was  on  too  colossal  a  scale 
for  him  to  ignore  it.  The  apprentices,  then  in  Paris,  were  set  on 
the  track  "his  brisk  and  mobile  apprentices,  his  apprentices 
Envoys  Extraordinary."  A  detective  was  employed.  The  services 
of  Bodington  and  Alexander,  English  lawyers  in  Paris,  were 
engaged.  It  was  a  moment  of  incessant  messages  and  letters  and 
wires,  of  cheques  sent  across  the  Channel  and  pictures  brought 
back.  It  was  hoped  Carmen  knew  something  and  Whistler  had 
her  shadowed,  though  he  must  always  look  upon  her  with  indul 
gence,  he  said,  and  would  no  more  harm  her  than  destroy  his  Phryne. 
He  was  always  fond  of  her.  She  had  been  his  model  as  a  child, 
was  still  his  model  in  Paris,  the  model  for  the  beautiful  Napolitaine, 
once  in  the  Canfield  collection.  And  she  amused  him.  She  never 
really  grew  up;  was  always  the  child.  He  liked  to  see  her  about  the 

1902]  243 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

studio,  to  laugh  at  her  childlike  nonsense.  He  delighted  in  her 
delight  in  the  Academic  Carmen.  She' was  like  a  big  baby  through 
it  all.  When  he  advanced  her  two  hundred  pounds  to  start  the 
school,  "the  faithful  apprentice"  went  with  her  to  deposit  the 
cheque  at  the  Credit  Lyonnais  where  nothing  would  persuade  her 
to  endorse  it  by  any  name  save  "Carmen,"  to  the  despair  of  the 
cashier,  the  irritation  of  the  apprentice,  and  the  amusement  of 
Whistler  when  he  heard  of  it.  Then,  with  her  first  profits  from  the 
school,  she  bought  herself  a  silk  gown,  strutted  up  and  down  in  it 
before  Whistler,  boasted  that  it  was  the  fashion  in  the  Temple 
where  she  got  it,  was  so  gay  that  Whistler  could  but  share  in  her 
gaiety.  Most  likely  he  would  not  have  prosecuted  her  even  had  he 
suspected  her.  But  he  wanted  his  paintings  and  prints — one 
painting  in  particular  because  it  was  not  finished  and  he  did  not 
care  to  have  his  unfinished  work  go  before  the  public.  He  wanted 
also  to  learn  the  truth — to  find  out  how  these  things  had  vanished 
from  the  studio  and  he  thought  Carmen  might  know.  She  was 
brought  to  London.  "The  watchful  apprentice"  saw  her  into  the 
train  in  Paris,  Miss  Draughn,  then  posing  for  him,  met  her  in 
London  and  secured  a  room  for  her  in  the  same  house.  She  was 
interviewed  by  Mr.  Webb.  But  nothing  whatever  came  of  it. 
He  was  no  nearer  the  truth  when  Carmen  started  back  for  Paris, 
and  Whistler  was  more  worried  than  ever  when,  going  to  Charing- 
Cross  Station  to  make  sure  she  got  off,  he  discovered  her  in  ani 
mated  talk  with  a  servant  who  looked  after  him  in  the  Fitzroy 
Street  studio,  though  there  was  some  consolation  in  the  sort  of 
Sherlock  Holmes  part  he  found  himself  playing.  The  facts,  the 
chances  are,  will  never  be  known.  What  is  certain  is  that  Carmen 
was  in  possession  of  an  interesting  collection  of  Whistlers.  Freer, 
who  had  her  followed  to  Rome,  bought  some  of  them,  and  they 
are  now  in  the  Freer  Gallery,  Washington.  A  few  months  after 
Whistler's  death,  she  sold  the  others  at  the  Hotel  Drouot  in  Paris, 
together  with  his  letters  to  her,  those  concerning  the  Academic 
Carmen  of  the  utmost  interest.  Her  explanation  to  the  manager 
of  the  Hotel  Drouot  was  that  Whistler  gave  her  the  paintings  and 
prints,  instead  of  money,  in  payment  of  bills  he  owed  her.  There 
the  matter  rests.  Some  of  the  missing  things  were  not  in  her  pos 
session,  but  we  heard  from  a  Paris  dealer  of  their  being  brought  to 
him  by  servants  of  Whistler's  who  also  explained  that  it  was  thus 
he  paid  them.  All  this  gave  Whistler  in  London  and  Bath  the  same 
anxiety  he  had  gone  through  in  Venice  over  canvases  lost  in  the 
confusion  of  the  bankruptcy,  and  he  was  now  less  able  to  bear  it. 
Without  doubt,  the  strain  told  upon  his  health  and  had  something 

244  [1902 


LA  NAPOLITAINE,  ROSE  ET  OR 
Portrait  of  Carmen  Rossi 

OIL 

In  the  possession  of  Messrs.  Knoedler  and  Co. 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

to  do  with  his  rapidly  increasing  weakness  throughout  this  winter 
and  spring.  It  was  only  in  his  lighter  moods  he  could  make  a 
jest  of  his  legal  adventures,  though  it  was  about  this  period  he 
described  them  to  Drouet  as  "la  seule  joie  qui  me  reste." 

September  1st.  Though  Miss  Philip  had  told  me  how  very  serious 
was  the  question  of  the  knocking  next  door,  Whistler  himself  seemed 
in  such  good  spirits  and  looked  so  well  when  I  met  him  a  week 
later,  that  it  came  as  a  shock  when,  just  as  we  were  wondering 
why  he  did  not  answer  J.'s  letter  announcing  his  return,  we  heard 
that  he  had  been  sent  away  because  of  his  health.  Then  came  the 
alarming  reports  in  the  papers  of  his  illness  at  The  Hague — then 
the  reassuring  letter  from  Miss  Philip  to  me,  and  letter  and  tele 
grams  from  himself.  Now  several  weeks  later,  I  started  for 
Belgium  and  Holland. 

Friday,  September  $th.  From  Amsterdam  I  took  the  train  to 
The  Hague  to  see  Whistler.  The  Saturday  before,  thinking  I  had 
gone  straight  to  Haarlem,  he  went  there  with  the  Sauters,  and  drove 
to  three  hotels  looking  for  me.  Then  on  Tuesday  in  Amsterdam, 
I  had  a  telegram  asking  me  how  long  I  was  staying.  I  answered, 
till  Friday.  Then  I  heard  no  more.  Thursday  I  went  off  for  the 
day  to  the  Island  of  Marken  with  the  Fraleys.  Walking  home  along 
the  Canal  from  the  Dam,  I  stopped  in  a  shop.  I  suddenly  saw  him 
pass  in  a  cab,  I  rushed  out,  but  the  cab  had  gone.  Got  to  the  hotel 
to  find  he  had  telegraphed  he  was  coming,  had  come  there  at  noon, 
and  returned  about  five  when  the  porter  said  I  probably  would 
be  back. 

At  The  Hague,  found  him  in  lodgings  near  the  Hotel  des  Indes — 
in  what  they  call  in  England,  a  bed-sitting  room.  Mrs.  Whibley 
and  Miss  Philip  in  a  bedroom  adjoining.  In  the  midst  of  the  pack 
ing,  it  looked  rather  comfortless.  He  was  at  the  table,  in  the  midst 
of  bills  and  cheques,  told  me  he  was  leaving  for  England  the  next 
day.  "How  could  you  have  gone  to  the  Island  of  Marken,  of  all 
places,  when  I  had  come  to  go  with  you  to  the  Gallery!  and  Effie 
Deans,  and  the  Rembrandts!  Joseph  and  you  are  as  careful  as 
ever.  It  was  the  time  of  all  others  when  you  might  have  helped 
1902]  245 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

me.  Joseph  did  not  know  what  papers  had  published  the  Ashbee 
story,  but  then  why  didn't  he  go  and  see?  Heinemann  found  out 
and  sent  the  papers  the  next  day.  It  was  a  little  thing  I  would 
have  remembered.  Now  there  is  a  little  thing  the  other  way  to 
remember!"  He  had  an  engagement  with  the  Doctor  and  left 
me  to  lunch  with  "the  Ladies." 

They  told  me  how  ill  he  had  been,  for  a  long  while  it  was  a  question 
if  he  could  get  well,  even  now,  the  Doctor  said  he  could  keep  well 
only  by  the  greatest  care  and  constant  watchfulness — he  mustn't 
walk  up  many  stairs,  above  all  he  mustn't  have  any  excitement! 
and  how  was  that  to  be  prevented  ?  They  told  me  how  good  Mr. 
Freer  had  been,  staying  on  with  him  and  giving  up  all  his  plans; 
how  they  were  besieged  by  journalists  and  it  was  The  N.  Y.  Herald 
man  who  had  started  the  report;  how  the  apprentice,  Mr.  Addams, 
came  in  the  most  extraordinary  clothes,  staying  at  a  most  extra 
ordinary  hotel  with  such  a  reputation  for  crime  that  the  police 
had  an  eye  on  it,  sitting  up  all  night  to  paint  a  nocturne,  though 
Miss  Philip  said  even  she  might  have  told  him  that  was  not  the 
way  the  Master  worked.  Whistler  had  left  his  cards  on  the  Boer 
Generals.  And  then  Mrs.  Whibley  told  me  how  she  hurried  sud 
denly  from  London  one  day  in  just  the  clothes  she  had  on,  and  how 
she  had  to  pacify  Charles  by  writing  constantly  that  they  were 
expecting  to  return,  and  how  he  had  come  over  and  she  had  had  to 
conceal  him,  as  though  the  meeting  were  most  improper,  and  how 
Whistler  seemed  to  know  something  was  going  on  and  had  seen 
Charles  at  last  from  the  window  and  had  turned  upon  her — "Oh, 
Bunnie!  Middle-aged  and  stout!  It's  quite  unpardonable!" 
Whistler  came  in  again  for  a  few  minutes  before  keeping  his  final 
engagement  and  that  was  all  I  saw  of  him.  We  were  drinking 
whiskey  and  water  with  our  lunch,  for  this  last  day,  in  the  confusion 
of  packing,  there  was  nothing  else.  He  saw  it  at  once.  "The 
wine  of  the  Island,  of  course,"  he  said.,  I  could  see  that  he  was  in 
one  of  his  most  irritable  moods. 

E.  had  gone  over  to  do  some  galleries  for  The  Daily  Chronicle  in 
Belgium  and  Holland.  A  certain  amount  of  attention  had  been 
246  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

drawn  in  England  to  Whistler's  experience  in  the  Ashbee  house, 
to  his  illness  in  Holland,  to  the  knocking  that  was  the  chief  cause 
of  it.  Some  of  the  papers  published  articles  evidently  prepared 
for  obituaries,  which  Whistler,  whose  mind  had  not  weakened  if 
his  body  had,  did  not  fail  to  see.  It  was  then  he  wrote  from  The 
Hague  the  often  quoted  letter  to  The  Morning  Post  begging  that 
"the  ready  wreath  and  quick  biography  might  be  put  back  into 
their  pigeon-hole  for  later  use,"  and  apologizing  for  continuing  to 
wear  his  "own  hair  and  eyebrows  after  distinguished  confreres  and 
eminent  persons  have  long  ceased  the  habit;"  then  too  that  he 
made  up  for  years  of  ill-will  by  paying  in  public  gracious  and 
generous  homage  to  Swinburne  who,  however,  to  the  end  cherishing 
his  resentment,  could  find  no  finer  praise  of  Whistler,  we  have  been 
told,  than  "clever,  certainly  very  clever  but  a  little  viper." 
E.  has  already  referred  to  one  of  her  visits  with  Whistler  to  the 
National  Gallery  after  Mrs.  Whistler's  death.  Sauter's  visit  with 
him  to  the  Hals  series  at  Haarlem  is  described  in  the  Life.  And 
now,  his  desire  was  to  see  with  E.  in  Amsterdam  his  painting  of 
Effie  Deans  in  the  Rijks  Museum  and  to  study  the  Hals  and  the 
Rembrandts  there.  E.  saw  the  Effie  Deans  four  years  later  but 
alone.  Her  note  is: 

August  24th,  1906.  An  arrangement  in  grey  and  gold.  A  woman 
in  long  clinging  grey  skirt  and  a  yellow  shawl  held  tight  round  her 
shoulders  and  over  her  head;  her  face,  the  cheeks  rose-flushed,  is 
seen  in  profile;  her  right  hand,  nervously  opened,  is  raised  to  it. 
She  stands  against  a  grey  background.  To  the  right,  about  mid 
way  in  the  canvas,  is  the  Butterfly  in  the  same  gold  and  yellow 
as  the  shawl;  to  the  left,  low  down,  is  written  with  a  brush  in  the 
same  colour,  "She  sunk  her  head  upon  her  hand  and  remained 
standing  unconscious  as  a  statue. — (The  Heart  of  Mid-Lothian, 
Walter  Scott.)  "  The  quotation  is  a  good  description  of  pose  and 
feeling,  but  was  it  Whistler's  writing?  The  picture  seems  scarcely 
finished — its  charm  is  great. 

Visits  to  galleries  with  him — and  he  and  J.  have  tramped  the 
floors  of  the  National  Gallery  and  the  Louvre  together  many  times 
— were  extremely  interesting  but  rather  sensational  as,  during  the 
years  we  knew  him  intimately,  the  world  knew  him  well  by  sight. 
After  a  discussion  one  evening  in  Buckingham  Street  with  Timothy 
1902]  247 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Cole  concerning  Turner  and  Claude,  the  three  made  an  appoint 
ment  to  meet  the  next  morning  in  the  National  Gallery  when, 
Whistler  said,  he  would  prove  his  point.  Cole  was  working  in 
the  Gallery,  perched  on  his  high  stool  above  the  people's  heads, 
engraving  a  wood  block  on  his  little  stand.  He  came  down  from 
his  perch  when  Whistler  and  J.  appeared  and  they  went  to  where 
the  Claude  and  Turners  then  hung  side  by  side  as  Turner  wished 
they  should.  The  question  was  of  light,  of  sunset,  and  Whistler 
pointed  out  that,  as  J.  noted, 

Turner  painted  the  sun,  a  great  big  circle,  low  down  right  in  the 
middle  of  the  picture,  and  that  if  it  was  there  he  could  not  have 
seen  anything  else  or  even  have  looked  at  it.  And  yet  the  picture 
was  filled  with  detail  from  end  to  end  instead  of  light,  all  for  the 
benefit  of  the  Islanders;  in  fact,  you  could  not  have  seen  anything 
at  all,  the  sun  would  have  blinded  you.  Claude,  knowing  this, 
veiled  his  sun  in  the  same  place  with  a  thin  cloud  which  enabled 
you  to  see  the  sunset  without  being  blinded.  And  yet  neither 
Turner  nor  Ruskin  had  the  sense  to  see  that  the  earlier  artist 
solved  the  problem  where  they  only  made  a  mess,  the  one  in  his 
painting,  the  other  in  his  writing.  Neither  had  the  bra  ns  to 
carry  on  tradition.  And  then  the  architecture.  Claude  painted 
and  composed  architecture.  Turner's  architecture  would  not  stand 
up  if  anybody  tried  to  build  it. 

But  before  this  little  demonstration  was  half  over — it  took  only  a 
few  minutes — it  was  on  the  students'  day — all  the  copyists  had 
left  their  easels  and  gathered  round,  and  as  it  was  not  his  fashion 
to  pose  as  a  perambulating  lecturer  or  decent,  or  to  throw  pearls 
to  painters,  the  demonstration  came  to  an  untimely  end. 

Duret  has  memories  of  similar  walks  through  the  National  Gallery 
and  similar  talks  of  Turner  and  Claude,  and  no  one  who  ever  had 
the  privilege  of  visiting  a  gallery  with  Whistler  did  not  come  away 
with  a  clearer  conception  and  understanding  of  all  he  had  seen. 
A  short-hand  writer  should  always  have  been  of  the  party,  and 
it  is  the  world's  loss  that  Whistler  never  carried  out  his  project  of 
a  book  with  the  title  In  the  National  Gallery  with  Whistler.  The 
idea  came  from  his  talks  there  in  the  Eighties  with  Mr.  Malcolm 
Salaman,  then  an  art  critic  and  Whistler's  ardent  supporter.  Mr. 
248  [1902 


FROM  CHELSEA  TO  THE  HAGUE  AND  BACK 

Salaman  was  to  record  these  talks,  but  the  trouble  was,  Mr.  Sala- 
man  said,  that  when  he  called  for  Whistler,  Whistler  would  prob 
ably  be  off  etching  the  butcher's  shop  in  Chelsea  or  busy  with  a 
sitter,  and  when  Whistler  called  for  him  he  would  be  at  his  news 
paper  office,  and  nothing  came  of  the  project  save  a  few  odd  notes 
of  a  discussion  on  Veronese  and  Tintoretto. 

As  to  J.'s  not  sending  him  the  newspaper  clippings,  we  have  already 
given  an  idea  of  what  Whistler  sometimes  expected  and  asked  and 
demanded.  We  were  ready  to  do  anything  for  him,  as  he  was  for 
us,  but  there  were  limits.  To  have  got  these  clippings  would  have 
meant  one  of  us  going  to  every  newspaper  office  in  London  and 
consulting  the  files  of  the  papers  for  a  week  or  two.  E.  did  make 
just  such  a  search  for  him  during  the  Dreyfus  affair,  in  which  his 
interest  was  keen,  but  he  expected  it  always  and  we  were  too  busy 
to  do  it  ourselves  and  we  had  no  secretaries  or  clerks  as,  we  under 
stand,  the  modern  literary  person  and  painter  have.  Whistler, 
in  these  years,  usually  had  a  secretary,  and  he  had  also  "the 
Ladies"  to  attend  to  these  things  for  him.  But,  somehow,  he 
rarely  asked  them.  Heinemann,  however,  had  a  large  staff  and 
Whistler's  commissions  gave  them  something  useful  to  do,  and 
Heinemann  would  let  them  do  it.  But  what  we  wish  to  point  out 
is,  that  there  was  this  side  to  Whistler  and  that,  if  you  accepted 
it  and  let  him  get  into  the  habit  of  using  you,  you  had  to  keep  it 
up  always.  J.  made  him  understand  from  the  beginning  that  our 
friendship  with  him  did  not  run  to  our  following,  fetching,  carrying, 
collecting  for  him. ;  Occasionally  Whistler  forgot,  and  occasionally 
there  were  scenes,  as  there  was  that  morning  at  The  Hague,  but 
they  were  never  serious.  Other  people  were  willing  to  fetch  and 
to  carry,  but  gradually  they  rebelled,  and,  with  the  first  sign  of 
rebellion,  they  were  dropped,  and  this  was  the  cause  of  a  good 
many  rows.  As  Mr.  Walter  Dowdeswell  said  once  to  J.,  "Whistler 
needed  somebody  always  in  attendance,  somebody  to  butter  his 
toast  and  black  his  boots — but  that  was  the  end  of  somebody  as 
a  friend." 

The  reference  to  the  Boer  Generals  reminds  E.  that  some  of  them 
were  then  in  The  Hague  and  that  the  feeling  throughout  Holland 
against  England  was  bitter.  Whistler  arranged  for  "the  Ladies" 
to  drive  her  to  the  station  by  the  longest  and  most  roundabout 
way  so  as  to  show  her  the  beauties  of  the  Bosch,  and  as  they  drove 
along  the  beautiful  roads,  patriotic  youths  of  The  Hague,  seeing 
them  and  taking  them  all  three  for  hated  Englanders  picked  up 
and  threw  great  handfuls  of  gravel  at  them  as  they  passed,  which 
shows  how  strong  the  feeling  was. 

1902]  249 


CHAPTER  XV:  THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO  AFTER 
THE  RETURN  TO  LONDON.  THE  YEAR  NINETEEN 
HUNDRED  AND  TWO  CONTINUED 

Thursday,  September  i8th,  1902.  Not  hearing  from  Whistler,  went 
out  to  Cheyne  Walk  to  ask  after  him.  Found  he  had  been  ill, 
and  was  still  in  his  room.  He  sent  for  me  to  come  up.  His  room 
is  at  the  top  of  the  Ashbee  house,  where  the  window  might  look 
out  anywhere  but  on  the  river,  so  little  can  be  seen  from  the  "artis 
tic"  place  found  for  it.  Whistler  on  the  lounge.  His  Empire  bed 
at  the  other  end  of  the  room,  and  the  few  things  in  the  room  beau 
tiful  of  their  kind — he  in  a  white  silk  night  shirt  and  a  black  coat 
over  it.  Some  one  had  just  sent  him  a  New  York  Times  Saturday 
Review  with  a  notice  of  Sir  Wyke  Bayliss'  recent  book,  a  review 
which,  as  he  said,  showed  a  sense  of  things.  It  certainly  was 
written  by  some  one  who  knew  Whistler  and  all  about  the  British 
Artists.  He  thought  it 'might  be  Julian  Hawthorne.  He  seemed 
tired,  the  reading  of  the  notice  used  up  the  little  energy  he  had, 
and  I  only  stayed  about  half  an  hour. 

Anybody  who  knows  anything  of  Whistler  knows  that  Sir  Wyke 
Bayliss  succeeded  him  as  President  of  the  British  Artists — a 
President  as  colourless  as  his  own  water-colours.  The  book  was 
Olives,  a  feeble  production  which,  if  it  lives,  will  be  because  the 
author  chances  to  be  immortalized  in  The  Gentle  Art. 

Tuesday,  September  2$rd.  Called  .again,  and  found  Whistler 
moved  down  to  the  room  adjoining  the  studio,  the  Doctor  thinking, 
if  he  was  strong  enough  to  get  about,  the  stairs  would  be  bad  for 
him.  He  was  in  the  Empire  bed,  in  his  silk  night  shirt  with  a 
little  knitted  shawl  over  his  shoulders,  a  counterpane  embroidered 
in  gold  covering  him,  and  curled  up  close  to  him  a  little  purring 
kitten,  white  and  brown  and  gold,  in  harmony  with  the  counter 
pane.  Whistler  didn't  seem  as  well,  he  said  he  had  the  "jumps" 
and  I  only  saw  him  for  a  few  minutes.  When  I  asked  him  if  I 
could  do  anything,  he  said,  "Well  you  know  what  you  can  do,  but 
you  won't  do  it";  this  being  to  "go"  for  Ashbee,  Menpes,  Wyke 
Bayliss  and  the  others  of  the  "enemy"  generally.  He  doesn't 
250  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

hear  the  knocking  so  much  downstairs,  but  he  says  Ashbee  should 
be  hounded  out  of  the  Guild  and  everything  he  belongs  to,  and 
Joseph  ought  to  be  here  to  see  that  he  is ! 

The  Guild  is  the  Art  Workers'  Guild  to  which  nearly  all  the  dis 
tinguished  artists  then  in  London  belonged,  or  were  honorary 
members — except  Whistler.  J.  was  an  ordinary  member,  Sargent 
and  Cole  were  honorary  members.  The  Guild  gave  lectures  and 
discussions  on  Whistler's  work,  never  on  the  work  of  the  others, 
but  still  he  did  not  belong.  Twice  Way  talked  of  Whistler's  litho 
graphs,  the  early  ones.  On  one  of  these  occasions  he  showed  for 
the  first  time  on  the  walls  what  Whistler  had  done  in  Lithography 
and  brought  two  of  the  stones — The  Long  Bridge  and  a  figure 
subject — and  a  press,  and,  without  Whistler's  knowledge,  printed 
them  on  it  and  distributed  the  prints  he  pulled  to  the  members. 
The  appreciation  of  these  prints  was  so  great  that  they  were 
promptly  thrown  on  the  floor  or  used  to  light  pipes,  a  most  genuine 
expression  of  British  appreciation  of  Whistler's  art  at  that  time. 
It  was  about  1894  or  1895. 

What  William  Morris,  long  Master  of  the  Guild,  thought  of 
Whistler,  J.  learned  at  one  of  the  meetings  some  years  after 
Whistler's  death.  The  talk  was  on  William  Blake,  a  show  of  whose 
work  had  just  opened  at  the  Tate  Gallery.  In  the  course  of  the 
evening  a  story  was  told  of  William  Morris  who  had  objected  when 
Whistler  once  was  called  an  artist,  saying  that  he  wasn't.  Some 
body  in  the  company  could  not  agree,  declaring  that  Whistler  was 
a  painter.  "Any  fool  can  see  that  Whistler  was  a  great  painter," 
said  Morris.  Any  fool  might  think  that  a  great  painter  must  be 
an  artist. 

Monday,  September  2Qth.  Called  on  Mrs.  Whistler  to-day,  as  she 
asked.  She  had  written  to  say  she  would  be  only  too  glad  to  give 
us  any  information  she  could  about  Whistler  and  help  in  any  way. 
I  explained  that  for  the  moment,  owing  to  Whistler's  illness, 
nothing  was  being  done  about  the  book  but  that  we  were  collecting 
material.  She  was  rather  wandering  in  her  reminiscences,  dwelling 
particularly  on  Mrs.  Whistler's  illness,  but  I  gathered  some  facts. 
In  the  first  place  she  gave  me  a  paper  with  a  few  dates  she  copied 
from  notes  made  by  the  Doctor  for  an  Encyclopedia.  The  Doctor, 
unfortunately,  had  just  before  he  married  her,  destroyed  all  his 
letters,  including  Jimmie's,  these  covering  the  early  years  in  Paris, 
1902]  251 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  letters  too  from  Swinburne,  Rossetti,  and  others  of  the  group. 
Her  letters  were  of  recent  years  and  she  would  not  care  to  show 
them  without  consulting  him.  He  was  strictly  and  religiously 
brought  up  by  his  mother.  Once  when  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler,  who 
loved  the  country,  succeeded  in  dragging  the  Doctor  who  didn't 
love  it,  there  with  her,  and  was  telling  him  how  beautiful  it  was, 
he  said  it  was  just  "like  Saturday  afternoon."  When  she  asked 
him  what  he  meant,  he  told  her  that  when  he  and  Jimmie  were 
boys,  on  Saturday  afternoon  their  mother  washed  their  heads, 
overhauled  their  clothes  and  themselves  generally,  put  away  their 
toys  and  books,  and  prepared  them  for  Sunday,  when  they  were 
taken  to  church  three  times.  She  was  very  pious,  and  would  like 
to  have  had  one  of  her  sons  a  parson.  Jimmie  was  her  favourite, 
though  she  was  never  quite  in  sympathy  with  him  or  his  work. 
When  she  lived  with  him  in  Chelsea,  it  was  a  succession  of  shocks — 
once  she  came  up  to  the  studio  to  find  the  parlour  maid  standing 
to  him  for  the  nude.  Jimmie  was  devoted.  When  she  was  ill  he 
could  not,  as  he  never  could,  stand  the  sight  of  illness.  She  was 
taken  down  to  Hastings  to  live — toward  the  end,  as  at  one  or  two 
intervals  before,  her  mind  wandered.  There  was  one  melancholy 
week,  when  Jimmie  and  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler  were  the  only  two  of 
the  family  there  with  her.  A  nurse  was  in  charge,  and  they  used 
to  go  on  long  tramps,  the  only  thing  they  could  do.  There  was  a 
particularly  melancholy  afternoon,  windy  and  wet,  when  they  were 
up  on  the  cliffs  together,  and  Jimmie  was  taking  himself  to  task 
for  not  having  been  kind  and  considerate  enough — he  had  not 
written  as  often  as  he  should  from  Venice — he  fairly  cried  with 
remorse.  "It  would  have  been  better,"  he  said,  "had  I  been 
a  parson!" 

Mrs.  Whistler  knew  little  of  the  Paris  days,  but  the  Chelsea  days, 
she  said,  were  delightful.  She  and  the  Doctor  went  to  his  Sunday 
morning  breakfasts,  and  brought  their  silver  because  he  hadn't 
enough.  Jimmie's  man  appropriated  some  of  it,  it  was  not  marked 
and  the  design  was  a  very  usual  one,  the  King's  pattern.  He 
replaced  it  with  plated  things  and  she  never  discovered  it  till  later 
on.  Then  Godwin  built  the  house  for  Whistler,  and  Godwin  had 
252  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

a  way  of  always  making  his  estimates  lower  than  the  actual 
expenses,  and  then  siding  entirely  with  the  builders  in  case  of 
disagreements  and  misunderstandings.  That  was  the  way  the 
crash  came.  The  woman  who  was  living  with  him  then — "Morals 
never  were  of  any  account,"  the  Doctor  used  to  say — went  to 
Venice  with  him.  It  was  she  who  later  on  made  things  so  unpleas 
ant  by  living  in  Paris  when  the  Whistlers  were  at  the  Rue  du  Bac 
and  calling  herself  Mrs.  Whistler.  "Trixie"  felt  it  awfully,  for 
she  always  was  extremely  jealous  of  Whistler's  past.  Then  came 
the  long  story  of  Mrs.  Whistler's  illness,  gone  over  again  and  again, 
the  misery  of  Whistler,  unwilling  to  admit  it,  his  putting  the  case 
in  the  hands  of  some  obscure  French  doctor,  whom  the  Doctor 
just  stopped  from  performing  the  operation,  his  indignation  with 
the  Doctor  for  not  believing  she  could  recover,  and  with  herself 
for  having,  he  said,  told  people  it  was  cancer.  This  was  the  cause 
of  the  fight  with  the  Doctor.  In  his  indignation  at  the  moment, 
Mrs.  Whistler  regretted,  he  never  thought  that  in  giving  way  to 
it  he  might  be  losing  a  friend,  and  the  Doctor  was  the  best  friend 
he  ever  had.  Whistler  was  so  furious  that  he  never  let  them  know 
of  Mrs.  Whistler's  death.  They  were  dining  at  the  Savoy  and  they 
heard  it  from  friends  they  met  there  by  chance.  The  quarrel 
preyed  so  on  the  Doctor's  mind  that  it  drove  him  into  the  "unfor 
tunate  habits"  that  were  really  the  cause  of  his  death.  When  he 
was  ill,  however,  and  she  went  round  to  the  studio,  Jimmie  came 
at  once.  The  Doctor  told  her  then  one  of  the  valves  of  Whistler's 
heart  was  affected  but  that  there  was  no  reason  why  he  should 
not  outlive  him,  the  Doctor. 

The  Valparaiso  trip  was,  as  far  as  she  knew,  taken  just  for  pleasure, 
though  she  had  no  doubt  that  many  things  were  left  in  confusion 
behind.  He  had  always  flung  his  money  away — such  extravagance 
— it  was  spent  and  wasted  by  the  women  who  were  always  about 
him.  Coming  back  from  Valparaiso,  he  was  kept  not  in  irons,  but 
in  his  stateroom  from  the  time  he  took  the  "nigger"  he  found  in 
his  stateroom  and  knocked  his  head  against  the  smoke  stack;  the 
story  Whistler  told  us.  At  the  time  of  Lady  Haden's  engagement, 
Whistler,  then  a  boy  of  about  twelve,  came  with  his  father  to  Eng- 
1902]  253 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

land.    After  seeing  Haden  for  the  first  time,  Whistler's  remark  to 
his  father  was,  "He's  just  like  a  schoolmaster,  isn't  he!' 

Mrs.  Whistler,  whom  E.  went  to  see  was  Mrs.  Dr.  William  Whistler, 
Whistler's  sister-in-law.  The  Mrs.  Whistler  to  whom  she  referred 
was,  of  course,  Whistler's  wife.  It  was  Maud  Franklin  who  joined 
him  in  Venice,  who  returned  with  him  to  London,  and  who,  as  we 
have  said,  signed  herself  at  that  time  Maud  Whistler. 
For  some  few  years  Whistler  and  his  brother  did  not  see  each  other, 
a  grief  to  both.  The  Doctor  had  always  been  Whistler's  truest 
friend;  the  Doctor's  house  in  Wimpole  Street  was  his  home  when 
he  was  ill  or  weary.  This  was  their  first  serious  difference.  How 
ever,  three  years  or  so  before  the  Doctor's  death,  when  he  was  in 
money  difficulties,  Whistler,  through  Lady  Haden,  came  to  his  aid. 
"It  is  Jimmie  all  over,"  the  Doctor  told  his  sister,  "generous  and 
open-handed  as  I  have  always  known  him,"  and  he  went  on  to 
say  that  often  he  remembered  Whistler  giving  to  others  what  he 
had  not  himself,  "the  pluckiest  fighter  against  odds  and  the  most 
splendid  worker  that  I  have  ever  known."  This  generous  side  of 
Whistler  is  the  one  least  often  dwelt  upon,  and  two  other  instances 
might  be  added  that  we  do  not  think  have  ever  got  into  print.  One 
we  have  from  Mr.  Alan  S.  Cole.  In  Paris  an  Englishman,  a  con 
firmed  morphomaniac,  when  he  was  absolutely  penniless  came 
begging  to  Whistler  who,  though  Mr.  Cole  told  him  the  truth, 
lodged  the  man  in  a  decent  hotel,  the  St.  Romain  we  believe, 
clothed  and  fed  him  until  at  last  the  hopelessness  of  the  case  could 
no  longer  be  denied  and  he  had  to  be  sent  to  some  sort  of  home  or 
sanatarium.  The  other  instance,  from  Mrs.  Addams,  was  of  a 
student  at  the  Academic  Carmen,  a  girl  whose  father  allowed  her 
fifteen  shillings  a  week  to  live  on,  though  her  brother  was  sent  to 
Eton — a  distinction  between  sons  and  daughters  then  not  uncom 
mon  in  England.  She  shared  rooms  with  two  other  students,  all 
three  existing  in  the  utmost  poverty.  Whistler,  learning  this, 
would  send  her  things  to  eat  by  Carmen,  sometimes  would  even 
send  her  gloves,  seeing  she  had  none;  he  had,  by  accident,  just 
come  upon  gloves  that  he  thought  would  suit  her,  was  his  message. 
Of  his  thoughtfulness  for  children  many  instances  are  in  the  Life. 
Of  his  little  models,  waifs  and  strays  from  the  streets,  he  was  ever 
careful.  If  he  could  not  come  to  the  studio  at  the  hour  appointed 
for  them,  he  would  notify  the  housekeeper  at  Fitzroy  Street  and 
beg  her  to  let  them  wait  in  the  kitchen  where  it  was  warm.  This 
was  the  real  Whistler,  not  the  Whistler  the  world  thought  it  knew. 
His  consideration  for  servants  was  as  great,  though  they  were  not 
254  [1902 


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LITTLE  EVELYN 
Daughter  of  D.  C.  Thomson,  Esq. 

LITHOGRAPH.   W.    IIO 

By  permission  of  Kennedy  and  Co. 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

invariably  as  considerate  in  return.  To  one  or  two  robberies  in 
the  studio  were  traced,  while  in  the  Lindsey  Row  days,  an  amazing 
Mrs.  Cozzens,  who  presided  over  his  kitchen,  repaid  his  kindness 
by  drinking  like  a  fish.  He  quoted  Watts-Dunton  as  saying  he 
always  liked  her  best  when  she  was  very  drunk,  and  Lord  Redesdale 
had  a  funny  story  of  her,  in  a  state  of  collapse  in  the  hall  one 
evening  when  he  came  in  late  with  Whistler,  but  with  her  wits 
enough  about  her  to  look  up  and  smile  upon  them — "I-sh-shtaking 
care  of  the  house  for  you,"  she  said  to  Whistler,  so  that  afterwards 
it  got  to  be  a  saying  with  them  that  anybody  who  was  drunk  was 
taking  care  of  the  house  for  them. 

Wednesday,  October  1st.  Went  to  call  on  Whistler  in  the  afternoon. 
He  was  not  ready  to  see  me,  and  I  sat  upstairs  for  about  half  an 
hour  with  Mrs.  Philip.  When  he  sent  for  me,  told  me  he  had  got 
up  especially  to  recei/e  me.  Tea  was  brought  in,  but  he  dozed 
off  almost  at  once,  and  I  had  not  more  than  a  dozen  words  with 
him  before  it  was  time  for  me  to  keep  my  engagement  to  take  tea 
with  Mr.  Landor.  Whistler  struck  me  as  weaker  than  when  I 
last  saw  him. 

During  this  last  illness,  Whistler  was  so  weak  on  certain  days  that 
he  hardly  opened  his  mouth. 

Monday,  October  i^th.  Called  on  Whistler  late  in  the  afternoon 
after  almost  two  weeks,  but  had  not  been  able  to  get  there  sooner, 
because,  in  the  meanwhile,  J.  has  come  home  from  Spain,  very 
seedy.  Found  Whistler  lying  on  a  long  steamer  chair,  but  in  the 
studio,  which  seemed  an  improvement.  He  wanted  to  know  all 
about  Joseph.  "Well,  you  know,  he  must  see  a  Doctor,"  he  said, 
and  when  I  said  he  wouldn't,  he  told  me,  "  It  is  your  duty  to  send 
for  one  without  saying  anything  to  Joseph  about  it  until  the  Doctor 
appears  on  the  scene."  "But  imagine,"  I  told  him,  "Joseph's 
indignation  with  me  for  doing  such  a  thing  without  consulting 
him."  "No,"  Whistler  said,  "it  will  be  just  as  it  was  with  me. 
When  they  wanted  to  bring  in  a  doctor  to  see  me,  I  declared  I 
wouldn't,  but  once  they  brought  him  without  telling  me.  I  just 
clung  to  him  and  have  clung  ever  since.  Tell  Joseph  that."  Miss 
Philip  left  the  studio,  and  no  sooner  had  she  gone  than  he  promptly 
1902]  255 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

fell  asleep,  the  cat  curled  up  sleeping  at  his  feet.  And  though  Miss 
Philip  came  back  and  we  had  tea,  he  never  woke  up  until  just  as 
I  was  going  and  Sauter  came  in  to  see  him. 

Sunday,  October  igth.  Coll  Cooper  and  his  wife,  who  to-day  turned 
up  unexpectedly,  lunched  with  us.  They  talked  a  good  deal  of  the 
Academic  Carmen  in  Paris,  "the  Whistler  School,"  of  course  they 
called  it,  as  everybody  does.  They  seemed  under  the  impression 
that  Whistler  had  made  a  good  thing  of  it;  the  charge  was  fifty 
francs  a  month;  no  one  was  admitted  for  less  than  a  quarter,  and 
then  he  never  came.  He  had  written  a  most  wonderful  letter  when 
the  school  came  to  an  end.  Cooper  couldn't  remember  it,  so  as  to 
do  it  justice,  but  it  was  very  wonderful.  And  Addams,  the  appren 
tice,  had  called  all  the  students  together,  made  them  take  their 
hats  off,  and  then  read  it  to  them  with  great  solemnity.  It  was 
extraordinary,  Cooper  said,  how  all  the  students  who  had  been 
at  the  school  and  once  understood  Whistler's  methods,  never 
gave  them  up  afterward.  He  did  not  think  Whistler  a  good 
master  for  this  very  reason,  he  impressed  himself  too  strongly  on 
his  students. 

"Coll"  Cooper  is  Mr.  Colin  Campbell  Cooper,  and  his  wife,  Emma 
Lambert  Cooper.  He  was,  all  unconsciously,  stating  Whistler's 
theory  of  teaching,  which  was  to  carry  on  the  old  tradition  of 
teaching — the  master  should  teach  the  pupils  to  draw  and  to  paint 
in  his  way,  they  should  learn  all  he  knew  from  him  by  precept  and 
practise,  and  then  they  should  either  be  able  to  help  him  in  his 
work,  as  the  pupils  of  the  Old  Masters  did,  or,  having  learned  all 
they  could,  start  out  and  do  something  for  themselves.  As  he 
often  said,  he  could  teach  anybody  to  draw  or  to  paint  in  his  way, 
and  that  was  exactly  what  the  Old  Masters  had  done,  but,  after 
they  had  been  taught,  God  Almighty  alone  could  make  them  artists. 
Students  went  to  him,  however,  because  they  thought  he  would 
turn  them  into  artists  like  himself  immediately,  ignoring  the  fact 
that  his  position  came  from  the  knowledge  and  experience  of  a 
lifetime,  and  that,  besides,  God  Almighty  had  made  him  an 
artist.  His  is  the  only  way  that  art  can  be  taught,  but  in  this  age 
of  getting  art  quick,  nobody  is  taught.  The  pupils  get  a  smattering, 
and  they  get  nowhere.  As  for  the  financial  side  of  the  school, 
256  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

Whistler  not  only  never  made  anything  out  of  it,  but  he  was  careful 
to  see  that  Carmen  did  not  make  too  much.  Mrs.  Addams  told 
us  that  Carmen  began  by  asking  the  women  twice  as  much  as  the 
men,  and  there  were  weeks  when  Mrs.  Addams  paid  her  more  than 
a  thousand  francs.  She  asked  the  women  one  hundred  francs  a 
month.  But  when  Whistler  heard,  he  would  not  have  it. 

Monday,  October  2Oth.  Called  on  Whistler.  Nobody  else  there 
but  his  model  who  was  just  leaving,  a  Miss  Seton,  who  was  rolling 
up  her  reddish  hair  when  I  came  in.  "Most  people  think  she  isn't 
pretty,"  Whistler  said,  "but  I  find  hers  a  remarkable  face.  It 
reminds  me  of  Hogarth's  Shrimp  Girl  in  the  National  Gallery." 
He  had  been  working,  but  only  a  very  little.  He  did  not  seem 
able  to  get  back  to  it  again.  He  showed  me  a  sketch  of  her  head, 
against  a  grey-green  background,  on  a  tiny  panel.  He  had  been 
pottering  about  looking  at  accumulations  from  the  Paris  studio 
and  had  found  many  charming  things,  he  said,  and  he  showed  me  a 
delicate  little  study  in  quiet  greys  of  a  house  front  somewhere  in 
Touraine,  just  the  doorway  and  a  little  window  with  balcony 
above  it.  Then  tea  came  in  and  I  gave  Miss  Seton  tea,  and  he 
got  up  and  emptied  the  stale  milk  out  of  the  cat's  saucer  and  gave 
it  some  of  the  fresh  from  the  jug  on  the  tea  tray.  I  told  him 
Harrison  Morris  was  anxious  to  have  something  for  this  winter's 
show — "The  man  who  took  up  with  the  nigger?"  was  his  only 
answer.  He  seemed  uncertain  if  Joseph  ought  to  come  and  see  him. 
"What  if  there  are  microbes  hanging  about  him?  I  can't  have 
any  more  microbes — I  have  had  enough  of  them.  And  why  have 
you  been  so  kind  to  the  British  Artists?  Isn't  it  time  to  rub  in 
something  about  their  President's  book?  And  if  you  have  seen 
Strang,  did  you  impress  it  upon  him  that  it  is  his  duty  to  see  that 
Ashbee  is  hounded  out  of  the  Art  Workers?"  I  couldn't  tell  him 
that  when  Strang  told  Ashbee  what  he  thought  of  the  whole  per 
formance,  Ashbee  was  abusive  and  said  he  would  turn  Whistler, 
who  wasn't  paying  his  rent,  out  of  the  house,  if  he  were  not  so  ill. 
Whistler  is  still  wearing  his  extraordinary  costume  and>  as  he 
walked  about,  he  looked  so  old  and  feeble  and  forlorn,  that  I  hated 
to  leave  him  there  in  the  studio  alone. 

1902]  257 

17 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

When  his  strength  permitted  that  winter,  he  went  through  his 
canvases  and  prints,  sorting  and  destroying — preparing  for  the  end, 
though  we  doubt  if  he  permitted  himself  to  think  that  the  end  was 
within  sight — he  shrank  from  the  thought  of  death — so  much  was 
still  to  be  done  and  he  was  just  beginning  to  understand.  Lavery 
got  the  same  impression  one  day  when  he  found  the  big  canvases 
in  the  studio  stacked  near  Whistler,  their  backs  turned,  and  the 
fire-place  full  of  ashes.  He  had  been  burning  things  Whistler  said, 
"To  destroy  is  to  exist,  you  know."  He  had  a  bad  turn  while 
Lavery  was  with  him  and  Lavery  helped  him  to  the  bed — he  could 
hardly  get  his  breath.  When  he  sat  up  again,  he  drew  his  hand 
across  his  back  and  said  almost  like  a  child,  "I  don't  like  this  at 
all  Lavery,  not  at  all,"  and  Lavery  thought  he  had  begun  to  realize 
the  seriousness  of  his  illness  and  was  trying  to  put  things  in  order. 
Whistler's  care  for  his  little  cat  reminds  us  that  he  was  as  tender 
with  animals  as  with  children.  To  our  William  Penn  he  was 
charming.  William  had  a  reprehensible  habit,  when  we  were  alone 
at  dinner,  of  sitting  at  table  with  us  under  the  rose-shaded  lamp. 
He  gradually  became  so  used  to  seeing  Whistler  at  dinner  that  he 
forgot  his  manners  and  jumped  up  all  the  same,  and  Whistler  never 
objected.  On  the  contrary,  he  even  complimented  William,  sitting 
there  so  straight  with  his  tail  curled  round  his  paws  and  the 
inscrutable  look  in  his  eyes:  "William,  you  are  really  very  beau 
tiful."  William  Penn  died  the  winter  he  was  at  the  Hotel  Chatham 
and  he  sent  E.  a  special  word  of  sympathy.  He  was  so  distressed 
about  poor  William,  he  said.  He  was  long  haunted  by  the  tragedy 
of  a  green  parrot  in  the  Rue  du  Bac.  The  parrot  did  not  like  him 
and  one  day,  when  Whistler  was  trying  to  make  it  say  all  the  things 
it  said  willingly  for  Carmen  and  never  for  him,  it  lost  its  temper, 
flew  to  the  top  of  a  tree  in  the  garden,  and  then  refused  to  come 
down,  dying  gradually  of  starvation,  falling  to  the  ground,  a  lean 
little  corpse.  Its  death  depressed  Whistler  for  days.  He  felt  that 
he  was  the  all  unwilling  cause  of  it. 

Monday,  October  27th.  Called  on  Whistler  in  the  afternoon.  Found 
Miss  Philip  there,  the  model  just  going,  but  he  didn't  know  how 
it  was,  he  couldn't  work  any  more.  A  sketch  of  her  head,  with 
her  hair  falling  on  her  shoulders  just  started  on  an  oval  canvas  on 
one  of  the  easels.  He  was  exercised  by  a  letter  from  Mr.  Freer, 
enclosing  copies  of  letters  from  Mrs.  Arthur  Bell  to  Mr.  Freer  and 
Mr.  Freer's  answer.  Mrs.  Bell  wrote  to  say  she  had  been  commis 
sioned  by  Messrs.  Bell  to  write  a  book  about  Whistler:  the  most 
258  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

important  monograph  on  him  yet  published;  and  to  ask  if  Mr 
Freer  would  allow  her  to  reproduce  some  of  his  pictures  for  it  and 
could  tell  her  where  photographs  of  others  were  to  be  had.  Mr. 
Freer  answered,  with  a  politeness  not  unworthy  of  Whistler's  West 
Point  standards,  to  acknowledge  the  letter  and  to  say  he  made  it 
a  rule  never  to  allow  pictures  in  his  possession,  when  the  artist  was 
still  living,  to  be  reproduced  without  the  artist's  permission.  He 
would  therefore  refer  Mrs.  Bell  to  Mr.  Whistler  himself,  and  for 
other  photographs  and  material  to  dealers  in  London — he  might 
name  Mr.  Marchant  of  the  Goupil  Gallery.  Whistler  was  in  a 
state  of  wrath  and  uncertain  what  he  could  do.  Already,  before 
he  went  to  The  Hague,  he  had  received  a  letter  from  Bernhard 
or  Oswald  Sickert  saying  he  did  not  see  why  his  relations  to  Whistler 
should  be  disturbed  by  the  fact  of  any  difference  between  Whistler 
and  his  brother  Walter.  He  had  been  commissioned  by  Messrs. 
Bell  to  write  a  book  about  Whistler  for  one  of  their  series,  and  was 
now  writing  to  ask  Whistler's  assistance.  "And  I  never  answered 
the  letter.  And  now  comes  this  Mrs.  Bell.  And  what  redress  is 
there?"  I  told  him  I  was  sure  there  was  none  as  far  as  the  book 
was  concerned — he  couldn't  stop  anyone  writing  about  him — his 
only  chance  was  if  any  of  his  letters  were  used  without  his  author 
ity,  or  any  of  his  pictures,  of  which  he  held  the  copyright,  repro 
duced  without  his  permission.  He  said,  "That  is  just  what 
Heinemann  told  me  about  a  book  published  in  America  last  winter. 
What  can  I  do  ?  I  might  write  one  of  my  letters  to  the  Bells,  saying 
I  have  just  heard  through  Mr.  Freer  of  the  proposed  book — the 
honour  they  are  prepared  to  do  me — that  I  am  much  astonished, 
though  no  doubt  they  have  written  and  the  letter  has  not  reached 
me — that  I  must  ask  them  to  submit  Mrs.  Bell's  manuscript  to  me. 
If  they  refuse,  why  then  I  can  write  to  papers  like  The  Times  and 
The  Athenaeum  to  say  that  the  book  was  entirely  unauthorized 
by  me  and  published  without  my  approval  or  consent.  What?" 
The  whole  affair  seems  to  worry  him,  he  was  restless,  complained 
of  pains  in  his  back,  and  could  talk  only  of  the  insolence  of  doing  a 
thing  of  this  kind  without  the  slightest  reference  to  him  and  his 
wishes.  Miss  Philip,  coming  to  the  door  with  me,  told  me  it  had 
1902]  259 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

upset  him  completely.  It  was  the  more  provoking  because  when 
Mr.  Freer's  letter  came,  he  was  delighted  and  sent  up  for  her  to 
come  and  open  it  with  him  to  enjoy  it  the  more.  He  was  too 
nervous  for  me  to  refer  to  the  book  we  were  asked  to  do  by  Heine- 
mann.  I  only  said  it  was  a  pity,  since  so  many  people  seemed  to 
be  doing  it,  that  he  did  not  see  that  the  book  was  at  once  done  by 
the  people  he  cared  to  have  do  it. 

Tuesday,  October  28th.  I  called  to-day  on  Heinemann,  for  it  seemed 
to  us  both,  in  talking  the  matter  over,  that  if  Mrs.  Bell's  sheets 
of  manuscript  were  sent  to  Whistler  and  he  happened  to  be  in  the 
humour  to  like  what  she  said,  he  might  not  only  revise  them,  but 
give  her  material  and  his  approval  both,  and  so  put  an  end  to  our 
book  forever.  Heinemann  told  me  that  one  of  the  Bells  called  on 
him  this  morning  about  it,  came  to  ask  for  the  Connie  Gilchristj  the 
copyright  of  which  belongs  to  Heinemann,  and  anything  else 
Heinemann  might  have.  Heinemann  told  him  the  whole  scheme 
was  absurd,  that  Mrs.  Bell  didn't  know  anything  about  Whistler 
and  couldn't  write  anything  about  his  work  of  the  least  importance, 
that  Whistler  would  object  seriously,  that  material  had  been  col 
lected  for  some  time  past  and  was  all  in  our  hands.  Then  he  showed 
Bell  the  photographs  he  had  got  together  for  our  book — Whistler 
having  let  him  photograph  things  from  time  to  time.  And  imme 
diately  Bell  asked  him  why  he  couldn't  have  them  for  the  Mrs. 
Bell  book.  And  Heinemann  refused  to  let  him  have  anything  at  all. 
The  thing  to  do,  Heinemann  said,  was  to  get  Whistler's  consent 
to  go  on  with  the  immediate  publication  of  our  book,  that  the 
moment  was  difficult  because  to  urge  the  matter  might  make  him 
think  we  were  preparing  to  write  his  obituary.  But  he  could 
represent  that,  in  view  of  all  these  attempts,  and  of  what  Menpes 
and  Sickert  and  others  were  no  doubt  preparing  to  do,  it  would  be 
a  great  deal  better  to  have  the  book  done  as  he  wanted  it  done, 
just  as  Sargent  had  been  bothered  so  often  to  have  his  pictures 
photographed  that,  in  self  defense,  he  consented  to  Heinemann's 
making  a  book  about  him.  Miss  Philip  had  just  called,  she  went 
out  as  I  came,  to  ask  him  to  go  down  to  see  Whistler  tomorrow 
260  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

afternoon  at  six.  No  doubt,  it  was  about  the  Bell  book.  He  would 
go,  and  come  to  us  afterwards  to  dinner,  so  we  could  talk  it  all  over. 

Wednesday,  October  2Qth.  Heinemann  came  to  us  to  dinner, 
straight  from  Whistler,  whom  he  found  still  in  his  extraordinary 
costume,  but  gayer  and  more  like  himself  than  he  has  been  for 
months,  having  managed  really  to  get  to  work.  He  was  surrounded 
by  sheets  of  foolscap,  preparing  a  letter  to  Bell.  Heinemann 
persuaded  him  to  write  simply  that  he  disapproved  of  the  scheme 
and  begged  that  it  would  be  abandoned.  Otherwise,  he  would 
have  to  state  the  circumstances  and  his  disapproval  in  The  Times. 
Heinemann  told  him  that  in  Paris  he  managed  to  stave  off  Duret 
who,  it  seems,  is  writing  a  book  too,  which  also  is  not  approved 
of  by  Whistler.  Duret  won't  give  it  up,  feels  that  he  must  write  it 
(and  we  can't  help  feeling  that  it  would  be  interesting,  Duret 
knowing  so  much  of  the  early  years  in  Paris)  but  the  publisher 
has  given  it  up.  Then  Heinemann  suggested  that  Whistler  in 
self  defense  should  allow  him  to  announce  our  book  which  would 
put  a  stop  to  all  these  others.  But  Whistler  turned  upon  him  and 
said  that  he  came  like  a  Bismarck  or  a  Machiavelli,  demolishing 
other  people's  schemes  that  he  might  carry  through  his  own.  After 
that,  Heinemann  could  not  well  say  anything  more  on  the  subject. 
And  so,  the  matter  rests.  In  referring- to  Bell's  visit  he  told  rather 
a  different  story  from  the  one  he  told  me  yesterday.  He  said  he 
told  Bell  that  he,  Bell,  could  use  anything  if  he  could  get 
Whistler's  permission. 

All  this  time,  Whistler  could  not  bear  to  talk  about  our  book. 
As  he  had  already  told  us,  we  were  trying  to  make  an  Old  Master 
of  him  before  his  time.  His  nervousness  about  himself  is  beyond 
belief  and,  much  as  we  then  wanted  to  go  on,  it  was  absolutely 
useless  to  discuss  the  matter.  Duret,  who  is  Theodore  Duret,  did 
not  bring  out  his  book  until  after  Whistler's  death.  It  has  gone 
into  a  second  edition  and  has  been  translated  into  English. 
Whistler's  "extraordinary  costume"  this  winter  was  an  old  brown 
fur-lined  overcoat  which  reached  to  his  heels  and  was  always  well 
buttoned  up.  That  he  should  wear  it,  be  willing  to  be  seen  in  it, 
seemed  one  of  the  worst  signs  of  all,  though  when  he  was  ill  or 
1902]  261 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

depressed  he  did  many  astonishing  things  at  times.  We  remember 
once  when  he  appeared  wearing  one  black  shoe  and  one  yellow, 
and  his  explanation  was  that  he  had  a  corn.  Up  till  now  his  cos 
tume  for  the  sick  room  had  been  his  white  silk  night  shirt  over 
black  trousers  and  his  little  black  coat,  in  which  E.  mentions  having 
seen  him  on  several  occasions,  and  which  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler  said 
he  wore  whenever  he  went  to  Wimpole  Street  to  be  nursed  by  his 
brother.  The  brown  overcoat,  as  we  look  back  to  it,  seems  to 
mark  a  distinct  progress  in  his  illness. 

Thursday,  October  ^oth.  J.  went  down  to-day  to  see  Whistler, 
found  him  fairly  well,  but  so  many  people  coming  and  going  had 
no  chance  to  talk. 

Saturday,  November  8th.  To  Whistler's  late  in  the  afternoon. 
Mrs.  Whibley  there,  and  the  household  more  or  less  upset  because 
of  the  departure  of  the  Dutch  girl — Whistler  giving  Mrs.  Whibley 
directions  in  German  as  to  the  remarks  she  should  make.  He 
wanted  to  know  all  about  the  New  English,  and  was  delighted  to 
know  that  the  Baronet  this  time  was  skied — "Can't  be  buying 
any  more — what?"  I  told  him  of  Mrs.  MacMonnies'  huge  open- 
air  portrait  of  a  child  in  a  perambulator.  "Oh  yes,  a  blue  baby 
with  purple  shadows  sort  of  thing,  isn't  it?"  Asked  about  the 
critics  and  was  disappointed  because  I  had  seen  no  one  but  Kinder 
of  whom  he  never  heard  before:  "Rinder-pest,  was  it?"  Alto 
gether  he  was  in  better  form  than  I  have  seen  him,  and  looked  in 
better  form  for  he  was  dressed,  the  first  time  I  have  found  him  so 
since  his  return. 

When  Mrs.  Whibley  and  Miss  Philip  left  the  studio,  he  told  me 
the  story  of  De  Wet,  which,  he  said,  made  him  think  that  after  all, 
Sauter  was  fortunate  not  to  have  been  involved  in  the  matter  of 
the  portrait.  Constable  wanted  one  for  a  frontispiece  to  De  Wet's 
book,  and  young  Meredith  prevailed  upon  De  Wet,  who  had  no 
time  to  give  sittings,  to  let  Sargent  make  a  sketch  of  him  while  he 
packed.  Then  Meredith  jumped  into  a  hansom  and  rushed  off  to 
Sargent  and  begged  him  to  come  and  make  whatever  sketch  he 
could  in  the  time  and  under  the  circumstances.  Sargent  good- 
naturedly  agreed  to  do  what  he  could,  and  they  drove  back  to 
262  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

Horrox's  Hotel,  and  De  Wet  packed,  and  Sargent  made  the  sketch. 
"And  now,"  said  De  Wet,  when  it  was  finished,  "what  are  you 
going  to  give  me  for  it?"  Meredith  managed  to  arrange  matters 
by  saying  it  was  his  affair — Sargent  got  off,  and  the  Constables 
settled  by  giving  De  Wet  sixty  pounds.  Whistler  was  sad  about 
it,  "Well,  you  know,  I  wish  it  had  not  happened!  You  must  not 
tell  the  story;  it  is  sure  to  get  out;  but  then  it  must  not  come  from 
us — the  reason  I  did  not  tell  you  before  the  Ladies."  At  this  point 
Lavery  called  with  a  Miss  L.  and  I  came  away. 

Monday,  November  loth.  J.  went  down  to  see  Whistler — he  was 
a  wreck  again.  Boldini  had  been  to  see  him,  he  had  tired  him 
self  out — returned  to  his  overcoat  costume.  For  the  first  time, 
he  struck  J.  as  being  very  ill.  He  slept  most  of  the  time.  Studd 
was  there,  Lavery  came  in  and  altogether  no  chance  to  talk. 

Thursday,  November  ijth.  A  telegram  from  Whistler  was  waiting 
for  me  when  I  got  home  about  six,  asking  me  to  come  to  tea,  but, 
of  course,  it  was  then  too  late. 

Friday,  November  iqih.  Another  telegram  to-day  asking  me  to  tea, 
and  I  went  about  five  after  the  Walter  Crane  press  view  at  Dore's. 
Found  Sauter  there.  Whistler  wanted  to  hear  all  about  the  Por 
trait  Painters  and  the  press  view,  and  what  everyone  had  said. 
But  there  was  little  to  tell,  especially  as  Miss  Philip  had  been  to 
the  private  view,  and  I  hadn't.  He  thought  I  was  too  hard  on 
Lavery.  Why  did  I  do  it?  He  was  full  of  Guthrie's  election  to  the 
Presidency  of  the  Royal  Scottish  Academy,  he  telegraphed  con 
gratulations  at  once  and  made  a  copy,  which  he  read  to  us,  and 
also  Guthrie's  answer:  "Warmest  thanks,  my  President,"  which 
pleased  him  immensely.  Sauter  and  I  came  away  together,  Sauter 
coming  home  to  dinner  with  us. 

Thursday,  November  2Oth.  To-day  Wynford  Dewhurst  lunched  with 
us,  back  from  Paris  where  he  has  been  showing  h:s  pictures  at  the 
Grand  Hotel  and  seeing  all  the  critics.  Among  others  he  met 
M.  Duret,  who  sent  us  a  message.  He  had  been  preparing  to 
1902]  263 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

write  a  book  about  Whistler,  but  when  he  heard  from  Heinemann, 
through  his  publisher  Floury,  that  we  were  doing  it,  he  of  course 
retired  in  our  favour,  and  asked  Dewhurst  to  tell  us  that  all  his 
material  was  at  our  disposal,  which  is  certainly  amiable. 
I  went  down  to  Whistler's  later  in  the  afternoon.  He  kept  me 
waiting  upstairs  for  some  time,  sending  me  word  that  he  hoped  I 
would  not  get  tired  of  waiting,  he  had  so  much  to  tell  me.  I  sat 
in  the  dining-room.  It  is  extraordinary  how  comfortless  the  house 
seems,  his  illness  beginning  before  there  was  time  to  put  things 
straight.  His  beautiful  blue-and-white  china  was  in  one  corner, 
his  beautiful  glass  was  in  a  cupboard  in  another.  Brown  paper 
in  a  great  pile  filled  the  settee.  The  cloth  and  the  napkins  were 
still  on  the  table.  A  wooden  box  with  Eggs  printed  on  it,  and  odds 
and  ends  of  parcels  littered  the  old  satinwood  sideboard.  Every 
thing  looked  cheerless  and  ill-cared  for. 

Then  downstairs — he  had  dressed  to  receive  me.  He  was  more 
like  himself  than  I  have  seen  him  yet — the  cause:  a  letter  he  had 
just  been  writing.  "You  know,  Wedmore  in  The  Standard,  speak 
ing  of  The  Little  Cardinal  at  the  Portrait  Painters  referred  to  having 
seen  it  before — so  did  Claude  Phillips  in  The  Telegraph,  and  my 
letter  to  The  Standard  is  to  demolish  them  both — calling  Wedmore, 
Podsnap — discovering  Podsnap  in  art  criticism  and  almost  feeling 
the  thump  of  Newton's  apple  on  my  head.  What?"  He  was 
delighted,  he  read  the  letter  aloud,  then  made  me  read  it.  "Heine 
mann,  who  knows  the  Editor  of  The  Standard,  is  to  take  the  letter 
to  him,  and,  altogether,  you  know,  the  whole  thing  has  the  flavour 
of  intrigue,  and  I  do  believe  it  has  made  me  well  again."  Asked 
again  about  the  Portrait  Painters;  he  had  heard  something  about 
Van  Wisselingh  having  sent  some  Bauers  to  it,  what  did  that  mean? 
I  assured  him  that  whoever  told  him  had  got  the  facts  crooked. 
Van  Wisselingh  has  just  opened  a  show  of  Bauers  in  his  own  Gallery 
"I  knew  that  fool  Z.  was  wrong!"  When  I  asked  him  why  he  did 
not  send  the  beautiful  Mrs.  Vanderbilt  that  was  in  Paris  to  the 
Portrait  Painters,  he  said  that  when  Vanderbilt  saw  it  at  the 
Salon,  he  seemed  to  think  it  was  not  quite  finished,  "That  is,  that 
I  might  like  to  have  one  or  two  more  sittings  from  Mrs.  Vanderbilt 
264  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

— simply  an  excuse  for  not  having  the  picture  go  to  other  exhibi 
tions."  The  reason  Claude  Phillips  is  unfriendly,  he  said,  dates 
back  to  Paris  days.  "Phillips,  you  know,  was  playing  le  mondain 
and  was  at  the  house  of  the  Comtesse  de —  one  evening  when  I 
was  dining  there.  Phillips  was  talking  to  her  in  his  most  impres 
sive  manner  when  she  saw  me.  She  called  me,  turned  to  devote 
herself  to  me.  When  Phillips  at  last  walked  away,  she  said,  'Did 
you  ever  see  such  hands?  What  a  man!'  And  no  doubt  Claude 
Phillips  heard  and  did  not  like  it." 

Saturday,  November  29th.  In  the  afternoon  went  to  Whistler's. 
A  motor  car  at  the  door,  and  Heinemann  in  the  studio  with 
Whistler,  who  was  dressed  and  looking  much  better.  The  two 
were  deep  over  old  letters  and  newspaper  clippings,  preparing 
another  edition  of  The  Gentle  Art,  and  also  a  little  brown  paper 
leaflet  with  the  Wedmore  correspondence  in  The  Standard.  For 
Wedmore  answered  Whistler  in  last  Saturday's  paper,  and  The 
Standard  was  not  willing  to  print  Whistler's  second  letter.  The 
idea  is  to  print  the  two  that  did  appear,  then  the  unpublished 
Whistler  letter  and  clippings  from  past  notices,  books,  etc.,  by 
Wedmore  as  a  proof  of  how  for  twenty  years,  as  he  says  in  his 
Standard  letter,  he  has  been  praising  Whistler's  finer  work!  I 
was  still  reading  Wedmore's  letter  when  Mrs.  Heinemann  arrived, 
and  there  was  a  diversion  for  tea.  Then,  Whistler  returned  to  the 
old  correspondence,  and  read  a  wonderful  letter  to  the  Fine  Art 
Society,  when  they  complained  of  his  failure  to  complete  the  Venice 
contract  by  pulling  for  them  the  number  of  prints  agreed  upon, 
though  M.  Duret  had  told  them  of  recent  proofs  he  had  seen  in  a 
Paris  gallery.  Little  Brown  wrote,  apparently,  a  letter  from  his 
own  house  and  another  from  the  Bond  Street  shop,  and  throughout 
Whistler,  in  answering,  emphasized  the  distinction  by  referring  to 
Mr.  Brown  of  Surbiton,  Mr.  Brown  of  Virginia  Water,  and  Mr. 
Brown  of  Bond  Street,  Mr.  Brown  expert,  salesman. 
Then  he  arranged  with  Mrs.  Heinemann  for  a  sitting  next  Tuesday, 
and  the  Heinemanns  left.  "Is  Mr.  Heinemann  coming  back?" 
I  asked  Whistler,  thinking  perhaps  he  had  only  gone  to  put  his 
1902]  265 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

wife  in  the  carnage.  "I  hope  not,"  Whistler  said,  most  emphat 
ically,  "for  I  am  so  tired!  Tell  Joseph  he  must  come  soon,  but  I 
am  tired!"  And  he  looked  it.  But  he  went  back  to  the  letters. 
"I  do  come  across  extraordinary  things,"  he  said,  "listen  to  this 
I  have  just  picked  up,  written  to  Graves,  I  don't  remember  when, 
but  it  must  have  been  at  a  time  when  they  were  a  little  sore  about 
something."  He  read  it.  Graves  seemed  to  have  threatened  the 
bailiffs  and  Whistler  told  them  he  supposed  there  was  nothing  to 
do  but  to  turn  on  the  hounds  of  the  law.  "But,"  he  said,  "what 
do  you  really  think  of  the  appearance  you  will  make,  with  one  hand 
presenting  a  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  to  the  nation,  with  the  other 
turning  the  bailiffs  on  Whistler!  Well,  indeed,  is  it  that  the  right 
hand  does  not  always  know  what  the  left  doeth."  "It  ought  to  be 
printed,"  I  said,  "it  is  too  beautiful  to  be  lost."  "Yes,"  was  his 
answer,  "but,  after  all,  there  are  things  that  wouldn't  quite  do 
for  the  public,"  and  I  suppose  his  being  threatened  with  the  bailiffs 
would  not.  But  he  thought,  the  Du  Maurier  correspondence  might 
go  into  the  new  edition.  Where  was  it?  Miss  Philip  did  not  know. 
"Oh,  you  must,  Major,"  but  she  was  very  severe  about  it.  No, 
Ethel  would  probably  know,  she  did  not,  she  had  nothing  to  do 
with  it.  He  must  ask  Ethel.  Something  was  said  about  Mrs. 
Addams  and  the  baby.  Was  the  baby  an  apprentice,  I  asked. 
Whistler  laughed,  "Oh,  yes,  of  course,  it  was  born  an  apprentice." 

The  pamphlet  was  never  published,  nor  was  Mrs.  Heinemann's 
portrait  finished.  Whistler  had  a  talent  for  inventing  nicknames, 
and  at  this  period,  he  always  called  Miss  Philip  "Major." 

Tuesday,  December  3rd.  As  J.  was  getting  ready  to  go  down  to 
Whistler's,  a  telegram  came  asking  us  both  to  tea,  and  to  bring 
all  the  Wedmore  books!  I  could  not  go,  so  J.  went  alone,  without 
any  books.  Whistler  was  dressed  and  in  good  form.  J.  represented 
that  he  had  no  books  Whistler  hadn't  himself.  Where  were  his 
copies?  "Somewhere  about,"  Whistler  supposed,  but  he  did  not 
know  just  where.  No  one  seemed  to  know.  He  wanted  to  heap 
proofs  of  Wedmore's  appreciation  upon  his  head. 
266  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

Then  he  told  J.  the  reason  of  Wedmore's  irritation.  It  happened 
long  ago.  He  had  been  asked  to  dinner  at  the  Rawlinsons.  "I 
arrived.  In  the  middle. of  the  drawing-room  table  was  the  new 
Fortnightly  Review,  wet  from  the  press,  with  an  article  on  Meryon 
by  Wedmore,  and  there  was  Wedmore,  the  distinguished  guest — 
I  felt  the  excitement  over  the  great  man  and  the  great  things  he 
had  been  doing.  Wedmore  took  the  hostess  in  to  dinner.  I  was 
on  her  other  side.  And  I  felt  like  a  little  devil,  seeing  things, 
bent  on  making  the  most  of  them.  And  I  talked  of  critics,  of 
Wedmore  as  though  I  did  not  know  who  sat  opposite.  And  I  was 
nudged — my  foot  kicked  under  the  table.  But  I  talked.  And 
whenever  the  conversation  turned  on  Meryon,  or  Wedmore's 
article,  or  other  serious  things,  I  told  another  story,  and  I  laughed — 
Ha-ha! — and  they  couldn't  help  it — they  all  laughed  with  me,  and 
Wedmore  was  forgotten,  and  I  was  the  hero  of  the  evening,  and 
Wedmore  has  never  forgiven  me.'* 

He  began  to  talk  of  Raffaelli's  solid  colours  and  was  sure  they 
were  no  good.  His  reason  was  personal — he  did  not  like  Raffaelli. 
Raffaelli  was  a  Jew.  Then  he  came  to  London  in  the  old  White  House 
days,  with  a  letter  of  introduction  to  Whistler  who  had  to  be  polite 
and  a.sk  him  to  Sunday  breakfast.  But  that  was  all.  "Then,  you 
know,  some  time  afterward,  when  I  was  in  Paris,  Durand-Ruel 
gave  a  show  of  my  work  and  Manet's  and  others  of  my  friends. 
We  were  all  there  hanging  the  pictures,  and  had  been  all  day, 
and  when  evening  came,  it  was  a  question  of  dining  and  general 
gaiety.  RafTaelli  appeared.  And  he  was  effusive,  met  me  like  an 
old  and  intimate  friend,  called  me  'mon  cher  Vistlaire,  mon  clner 
ami]  and  I  thought  it  offensive,  a  presumption.  The  next  day  I 
was  again  at  Durand-Ruel's,  in  one  of  the  rooms  with  a  few  dis 
tinguished  people  and  critics,  Mirbeau  among  them.  Again 
Raffaelli  arrived,  and  again  was  familiar  with  'mon  cher  Fistlaire' 
and  'mon  cher  ami.'  I  put  my  glass  in  my  eye,  looked  him  up  and 
down,  let  it  drop,  told  him  that  I  did  not  know  him  and  did  not 
wish  to,  that  no  one  had  asked  him  there  and  it  would  be  more 
agreeable  if  he  were  to  go  into  another  room.  Raffaelli  was  in  a 
fury,  naturally — said  he  had  as  good  right]there  as  anybody  else 
1902]  267 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  would  not  go.  Very  well  then,  said  I,  as  your  company  is  not 
agreeable,  I  will  go;  and  so  I  did,  and  all  the  others  with  me,  leaving 
Raffaelli  alone.  A  week  later  Raffaelli  came  to  Mirbeau — he  had 
been  thinking  it  over,  and  had  decided  that  Whistler's  conduct  was 
notto  be  accepted,  would  Mirbeau  be  his  second  ?  Mirbeau  laughed. 
Had  Raffaelli  discovered  it  a  week  ago,  Mirbeau  would  have  been 
charmed.  After  a  week  it  was  too  late.  He  would  not  countenance 
it.  And  that  was  the  last  I  heard  of  Raffaelli  and  the  duel." 

The  dinner  at  Mrs.  Rawlinson's  explains  Whistler's  saying  that, 
"Well,  you  know,  when  I'm  asked  out  to  dinner,  I  always  enjoy 
myself.  But — well — I'm  never  asked  to  the  same  house  twice!" 
Whistler  loved  nothing  so  much  as  chivvying  people  like  Wedmore 
right  to  their  faces,  and  this  was  one  of  the  ways  he  got  his  reputa 
tion  for  malice  among  outsiders.  He  rarely  went  to  public  dinners 
because  at  them,  he  thought,  one  never  dined.  After  an  annual 
British  Artists'  dinner  at  the  Monaco,  when  Wyke  Bayliss  began 
his  speech  by  saying  he  had  dined,  "Ha!  ha!  Well,  I  haven't," 
Whistler  interrupted.  If  he  did  go,  the  pleasure  he  failed  to  get  in 
the  dinner  he  made  up  for  by  the  pleasure  he  got  out  of  the  people. 
At  a  dinner  to  Fred  Brown  when  he  was  made  Professor  at  the 
Slade  School,  or  else  at  a  New  English  Art  Club  dinner,  J.  cannot 
remember  which,  Whistler  was  put  on  one  side  of  the  Chairman 
and  Wedmore  on  the  other,  and  Wedmore  made  a  speech  which  J. 
has  completely  forgotten.  Then  Whistler  was  called  on.  Even 
before  this,  he  had  been  talking  generally  to  the  guests  at  the 
table  about  Wedmore  as  if  Wedmore  was  not  there,  and,  when 
he  got  up  he  went  on  in  the  same  strain  and  finished  by  talking 
straight  at  Wedmore  about  himself  as  if  he  were  some  one  else. 
The  poor  man  stood  it,  but  what  else  could  he  do? 

Friday,  December  5th.  A  letter  came  from  Whistler,  asking  us  to 
tea,  and  giving  suggestions  for  a  notice  of  the  show  of  silver  at  the 
Fine  Art  Society's  to  which  he  has  lent  some  of  his.  But  neither 
of  us  could  get  to  him,  and  when  I  went  to  the  Fine  Art's,  there 
was  no  press  view,  only  a  private  view  tomorrow.  I  telegraphed 
I  would  come  in  the  afternoon. 

Saturday,  December  6th.  Went  to  the  Fine  Art's.  There,  Whistler's 
silver  in  a  case  by  itself,  draped  with  white  napkins,  while  the 
268  [1902 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

other  cases  were  lined  with  red.  There  were  beautiful  pieces  in 
his  collection,  evidently  bought  for  use,  and  always  a  little  crowd 
about  it — people  wondering  to  find  the  Butterfly  on  silver  and 
linen  both.  Then  I  took  a  hansom  and  went  to  Chelsea.  He  was 
alone,  and  full  of  the  show — wanted  to  know  every  detail — "  how 
did  the  white,  the  beautiful  napkins,  look?  Didn't  the  slight  hint 
of  blue  in  the  Japanese  stand  and  the  few  perfect  plates  tell? 
Didn't  the  other  cases  look  vulgar  in  comparison?  And  didn't 
the  simplicity  of  my  silver,  evidently  for  use  and  cared  for,  make 
the  rest  look  like  museum  specimens? — What?"  He  examined  the 
catalogue,  found  his  McNeill  spelt  wrong,  and  could  not  understand 
why  the  entries  were  so  few  and  the  description  so  brief  when  it 
came  to  his  case.  No  doubt,  Percy  Macquoid,  who  arranged  the 
exhibition  and  prepared  the  catalogue,  was  indignant  because  he 
sent  "the  Ladies"  to  arrange  his  case.  Then  Miss  Philip  came  in. 
Evidently  "the  Ladies"  and  Macquoid  had  not  carried  things  off 
very  amiably.  When  I  told  him  Kinder  was  in  the  gallery,  he 
said,  "O,  the  man  I  called  Rinder-pest  the  other  day."  He  does 
not  forget  his  own  little  sayings. 

Whistler  began  to  show  me  the  proofs  of  the  Wedmore-Standard 
correspondence,  to  be  issued  as  one  of  the  brown-paper  covered 
pamphlets,  but  a  musical  friend  of  Studd's,  now  staying  with 
Studd,  was  announced.  "Damn!"  said  Whistler.  "Take  him 
upstairs,  Major,  he  is  one  of  your  friends."  But  Miss  Philip 
wouldn't,  and  the  musical  friend,  a  young  German,  came  in,  over 
flowing  with  enthusiasm.  It  was  such  a  joy  to  play  his  piano  in 
that  room  with  the  three  Whistlers.  Studd  was  so  distressed  that 
he  made  Whistler  angry  by  having  allowed  them  to  be  photo 
graphed  by  some  publishers!  And  such  pains  had  been  taken! 
The  photographers  were  almost  three  hours  doing  one  of  them. 
Studd  ought  to  have  consulted  him  Whistler  said ;  other  friends  who 
had  his  pictures  refused — the  publishers  did  not  come  to  him  for 
permission,  did  the  greater  part  without  his  knowing  until  he  heard 
of  it  in  a  roundabout  way — they  were  profiting  by  his  work  and 
him,  and  he  was  not  getting  a  penny  out  of  it.  Was  it  the  Bells? 
I  asked.  Yes,  it  was  the  Bells.  The  musical  friend  talked  of  the 
1902]  269 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

German  Emperor.  "Emperors  are  absurd  now,"  Whistler  said 
"It  was  all  very  well  when  they  could  say,  cut  off  this  man's  or 
that  man's  head,  and  it  was  done  at  once,  or  as  they  can  now  if 
they  happen  to  be  Emperor  of  China  or  Russia.  But  for  the  others, 
it  is  nonsense."  The  young  man  stayed  so  long  that  as  soon  as  he 
had  gone,  I  had  to  go  too.  "Tell  Joseph  he's  a  humbug,"  Whistler 
said,  "he  never  comes  to  see  me."  J.  had  been  only  three  or  four 
days  before. 

Thursday,  December  nth.  J.  went  down  early  in  'the  afternoon 
before  the  International  Meeting  at  Lavery's.  Whistler  up  and 
dressed,  but  looking  very  ill  and  coughing  most  awfully.  It  was 
his  tonsils,  he  said.  But  he  coughed  so  he  could  hardly  talk,  once 
or  twice  wrote  what  he  wanted  to  say,  and  seemed  weaker  than 
J.  has  yet  believed  him  to  be. 

Tuesday  ^December  1 4th.  After  lunching  to-day  at  Mrs.  Frankland's, 
went  to  Whistler's  and  found  him  looking  again  most  frightfully 
ill.  He  was  excited  over  the  fact  that  Montesquieu  had  sold  his 
portrait — "Montesquieu,  the  descendant  of  a  long  distinguished 
line  of  French  noblemen.  I  painted  it  for  a  mere  nothing — mon 
cher,  you  understand  Montesquiou  said,  and  it  was  arranged 
between  gentlemen.  And  now  Montesquiou  has  sold  it,  no  doubt 
for  a  large  sum  of  money!  He  had  written  to  me,  but  his  letter  is 
feeble — he  had  not  heard  from  me  for  so  long,  thought  I  had 
forgotten  him — no  excuse  at  all.  Canfield  has  bought  the  picture — 
Canfield,  an  American  who  was  here  last  winter  and  came  to  ask 
me  to  paint  his  portrait."  Was  that  the  portrait  of  the  man  with 
the  large  and  rather  ugly  face  I  had  seen  once  in  his  studio?  I 
asked,  and  he  said  "Yes." 

I  did  not  stay  long,  he  seemed  so  used  up.  But  he  rallied  when 
Miss  Philip  came  in,  to  tell  her  my  menu  at  lunch — a  kidney 
omelette,  a  beefsteak  and  kidney  pudding,  and  then  another 
pudding,  a  plum  pudding.  What  an  English  meal!  Miss  Philip 
thought  nothing  so  bad  as  a  menu  with  repetitions.  Who  was  it 
in  Dickens  had  watched  the  dinner  going  into  the  neighbor's  and 
everything  was  cooked  with  white  sauce?  Dickens,  however, 
270  [1902 


ROBERT,   COMTE  DE  MONTESQUIOU-FEZENZAC 


OIL 

In  the  Frick  Collection 


THE  INVALID  IN  THE  STUDIO 

seemed  to  think  it  specially  distinguished.  "Ah,  but  that  is  quite 
another  matter,"  Whistler  said,  "a  dinner  that  aims  at  a  certain 
harmony  throughout.  Wasn't  I  the  first  to  give  white  and  yellow 
lunches,  an  idea  copied  everywhere  afterward  with  great  pretense  of 
originality?"  I  stayed  a  very  short  time,  he  looked  so  exhausted. 
When  I  came  home,  I  told  J.  about  the  Montesquiou  and  said  it 
was  a  Mr.  Canfield  in  New  York  who  now  had  it.  Canfield,  J. 
said,  why  that  was  the  name  of  the  gambler  Kennedy  warned 
Whistler  against.  And  J.  gave  me  the  story  as  he  heard  it  from 
Kennedy  when  they  met  at  Siena  last  summer.  I  knew  of  a  differ 
ence  between  Whistler  and  Kennedy,  but  Kennedy  had  never 
explained  the  reason.  It  seems  that  he  had  come  over  earlier  than 
usual  that  year,  and  with  his  first  chance  had  spoken  to  Whistler 
of  Canfield,  thought  he  ought  to  know  before  getting  involved 
with  a  man  of  that  kind.  Over  here,  no  one  would  have  heard  of 
Canfield,  and  Kennedy  could  understand  Whistler's  receiving  him 
as  an  American,  and  painting  him.  But  the  man  was  in  every  way 
notorious  in  New  York,  and  Whistler  ought  to  know.  Whistler 
was  furious — indignant  with  Kennedy  for  telling  him.  Why,  Mr. 
Canfield  had  been  there,  had  been  received  by  him,  had  been  intro 
duced  to  "the  Ladies" — that  was  enough  to  establish  his  respect 
ability  forever:  if  he  had  been  introduced  to  "the  Ladies"  there 
was  an  end  of  it.  And,  in  his  indignation,  he  said  things  to  Kennedy 
that  Kennedy  could  not  forgive.  "He  may  say  what  he  wants 
about  the  Boers,  but  he  can't  say  things  like  that  to  me!"  And 
Kennedy  never  went  back,  and  that  is  the  reason  of  the  quarrel. 
Curiously,  that  very  evening  in  The  Star  was  a  despatch  from  New 
York  about  the  raid  on  Canfield's  gambling  place  in  New  York 
with  allusions  to  his  pose  as  patron  of  art. 

The  Montesquiou  was  bought  by  Mr.  Frick  and  hung  upstairs 
in  his  New  York  house — not  with  the  four  great  Whistlers  in  his 
office.  Whistler  was  never  satisfied  with  it,  wanted  to  get  hold  of 
it  and  the  Connie  Gilchrist  and  destroy  them  both.  The  three 
copies,  lithographs  after  the  Montesquiou,  attributed  to  him,  we 
do  not  believe  he  made.  He  may  have  worked  on  them.  If  the 
copies  are  his,  they  are,  like  the  etching  of  the  Irving,  which  he 
1902]  27 1 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

also  attempted  to  copy,  hopeless  failures.  But  we  have  an  idea 
they  were  done  by  Mrs.  Whistler.  Certainly  two  of  them  bear 
no  resemblance  whatever  to  his  work,  and  we  have  seen  references 
of  his  to  two  "my  wife  did,  far  more  beautiful!" 

Wednesday,  December  24th.  J.  to  Whistler's  to  report  about  the 
International  Meeting  the  day  before — Whistler  better  again, 
really  in  fairly  good  |form,  when  J.  at  last  saw  him.  But  he  was 
first  sent  mysteriously  upstairs  to  the  "Green  Room,"  was  at  inter 
vals  visited  by  the  charwoman  and  told  that  "Master  Whistler" 
would  see  him  soon,  was  given  the  papers  and  a  cup  of  tea,  but 
it  was  three  quarters  of  an  hour  before  he  was  asked  to  come 
downstairs  into  the  studio.  Dunthorne  was  there;  he  had  been 
buying  etchings,  and  was  making  out  a  cheque  for  Miss  Philip. 
Then  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Addams  came  in,  and  Whistler  insisted  on 
playing  dominoes.  Addams  at  first  objected — it  may  have  seemed 
to  him  too  trivial.  But  he  could  not  help  himself  and  they  played, 
Mrs.  Addams  winning  everything,  and  J.  was  an  hour  late 
for  dinner. 

He  played  only  dominoes,  and  he  loved  to  cheat  in  the  most  open 
fashion  that  was  meant  to  deceive  nobody,  when  he  shuffled  them 
getting  hold  of  some  which  were  marked  or  raised,  dragging  them 
to  him.  His  friends  understood  and  enjoyed  the  fun  with  him. 


CHAPTER  XVI:  THE  LAST  MONTHS.  THE  YEAR  NINE 
TEEN  HUNDRED  AND  THREE 

Thursday,  January  ist,  1903.  .  A  card  with  New  Year's  Greetings, 
Butterfly  and  all,  in  the  morning.  In  the  afternoon  I  went  down 
to  give  our  greetings.  Mrs.  Walton  was  there  for  the  same  purpose. 
Whistler  was  much  better,  according  to  Miss  Philip,  but  did  not 
look  it.  He  was  in  overcoat  again,  his  hair  flat  which  makes  his 
face  look  as  if  there  was  nothing  left  of  it,  and  he  fell  asleep  at 
intervals.  Mrs.  Walton  spoke  of  Benjamin  Swift's  lecture  at  Mrs. 
Lowrie's  in  Rossetti's  old  house.  I  told  Mrs.  Lowrie's  ghost  story. 
She  saw  a  man  on  the  stairs  late  one  night  on  coming  home,  thought 
272  [1903 


sPkjS 

lis 

v\ 


THE  MOTHER  HENRY  IRVING 

DRY-POINT.      M.  97  DRY-POINT.     M.   I?O 

From  destroyed  plates.     Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

it  her  husband,  and  called  "Frank!"  No  answer,  called  again, 
"  Frank,  you  brute,  put  out  the  light."  But  it  was  not  her  husband, 
only  an  unknown  ghost,  and  I  asked  Whistler  if  there  were  any 
ghosts  in  Rossetti's  day.  Not  ghosts,  he  said,  but  spirits.  Wonder 
ful  things  happened,  wonderful  things  were  going  on  in  Chelsea 
just  then,  and  there  were  evenings  at  Rossetti's  with  surprising 
results.  Just  what  these  results  were,  he  did  not  say,  but  he 
insisted  upon  the  difference  between  spirits  and  ghosts.  He  was 
too  tired  to  go  into  detail,  but  kept  dozing  off,  so  I  left  early. 

Thursday,  January  8th.  J.  went  to  Whistler's  to  report  about 
the  International,  having  arranged  to  meet  Lavery  and  Sauter 
and  talk  over  the  Howard  incident.  Lavery  and  Sauter  were 
both  there  when  he  arrived,  and  a  big  fat  man  with  clean 
shaven  face  wandering  about  the  studio.  More  pictures  were 
dragged  out  and  shown  than  J.  had  ever  seen  before  at  one  time, 
and  the  table  was  strewn  with  letters.  Whistler  was  evidently 
tired  out  and  very  weak.  He  said  to  J.  rather  with  hesitation, 
"I  want  to  introduce  Mr.  Canfield  of  New  York,"  and  the  big 
man  rushed  forward  with  both  hands  outstretched,  "Oh,  Mr. 
Pennell,  I  am  so  delighted  to  meet  you,  I  have  so  long  known  your 
work."  In  Whistler's  studio  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  to  shake 
hands.  But,  with  the  best  will  in  the  world,  it  is  not  easy  to  imagine 
this  Canfield  any  but  the  notorious  gambler  Canfield  about  whom 
Kennedy  warned  Whistler.  He  stayed  there,  in  a  far  corner, 
while  they  talked  over  the  International  affairs,  and  they  left  him 
there  when  they  went  off  together  to  Lavery's  studio.  Again  in 
leaving,  both  J.'s  hands  were  grasped  and  shaken  with  enthusiasm. 

Monday,  January  I2th.  J.  received  a  letter  from  The  Tribune  cor 
respondent  here,  I.  N.  Ford,  enclosing  a  telegram  from  The 
Tribune,  "Is  Whistler  painting  gambler  Canfield's  portrait?" — so 
there  must  be  some  sort  of  scandal  about  it  in  New  York.  We 
talked  it  over — felt  that  Whistler  ought  to  know — it  does  not 
seem  right  to  him  that  he  should  not  be  told.  But  warned,  as  we 
have  been,  that  he  should  not  be  excited,  we  are  afraid  to  tell  him 

1903]  273 

18 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

for  fear  of  the  consequences  to  his  health.  Not  willing  to  take  the 
responsibility,  J.  went  to  see  Webb  about  it,  and  Webb  has  under 
taken  to  tell  Whistler  how  the  matter  stands  when  he  goes  to  the 
studio  on  Thursday  before  the  International  meeting.  Webb  told 
J.  that  he  ought  to  write  the  Life,  and  J.  explained  that  Whistler 
has  already  asked  us  to  do  so,  and  Webb  said  he  was  glad  to  hear  it. 

Wednesday,  January  i^th.  Went  to  see  Whistler,  almost  won 
dering  if  it  might  be  the  last  time,  for  Webb's  interview  with 
him  may  make  him  as  indignant  with  us  as  he  was  with  Kennedy 
last  year.  Found  him  amusing  himself  with  the  book  about  him 
by  Elbert  Hubbard,  published  at  the  Roycroft  Press.  "Really," 
he  said,  "with  this  I  can  be  amused.  I  do  not  know  how  many 
already  have  used  my  name  in  this  fashion  and  usually  they  only 
irritated  me.  But  the  intimate  tone  of  this  is  something  quite 
new."  And  he  read  bits  of  it,  the  passage  about  his  father's  court 
ship  of  his  mother.  "What  would  my  dear  Mummy — don't  you 
know,  as  you  see  her  with  her  folded  hands  at  the  Luxembourg — 
have  said  to  that  ?  And  our  stay  in  Russia !  Our  arrival  in  London ! 
Why  the  account  of  my  mother  and  myself  coming  to  Chelsea  and 
finding  lodgings  makes  you  almost  see  us  wanderers,  bundles  at 
end  of  long  sticks  over  our  shoulders,  arriving  footsore  and  weary 
in  the  late  afternoon — amazing!  It  would  be  worth  while  to  de 
scribe,  not  the  book,  but  the  effect  on  Whistler  reading  it.  It  would 
be  worth  while  to  do  something  about  it.  I  must  think  it  over." 
While  he  was  still  reading,  Sauter  and  Lavery  came  in,  and  as 
I  knew  it  was  to  talk  over  the  International  and  its  affairs  I  left 
at  once. 

Thursday,  January  i$th.  We  dined  at  Sauter's  and  Webb  came 
to  the  meeting  afterwards.  But  when  at  Whistler's  he  did  not 
see  him  alone,  and  was  unable  to  say  anything — and  so  he  let 
the  matter  drop,  as  nothing  more  has  been  heard. 

Saturday,  January  ijih.  J.  to  see  Whistler  and  report  about 
Thursday  evening's  meeting.  An  unsatisfactory  visit.  The 
apprentices  there  and,  for  a  while,  not  much  chance  for  talk. 
274  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

Whistler  still  keen  to  have  Lanteri  on  the  Council  of  the  Inter 
national,  "this  distinguished  sculptor,  Master  at  South  Kensing 
ton."  He  was  coughing — J.  could  not  irritate  him  by  contradicting, 
and  he  said  nothing.  But  Whistler  is  all  with  the  Council  as  far 
as  Howard  goes. 

Francis  Howard — Francis  Gassoway — Francis  O'Connor — he 
nourished  under  the  three  names — is  a  young  gentleman  from  Texas 
who  went  in  for  art  and  art  dealing  and  art  criticism.  He  brought 
together  the  group  of  artists  who  founded  the  International.  These 
were  Lavery,  an  Irishman,  Guthrie  and  Walton,  Scotchmen,  Sauter 
a  German,  Alfred  Gilbert,  Ricketts,  Shannon,  GreifTenhagen, 
Englishmen.  Whistler,  before  any  meeting  was  held,  came  to  J. 
and  wished  him  to  be  a  member,  and  also  Ludovici.  Howard  was 
to  be  Honorary  Secretary.  J.  was  not  called  to  the  first  meeting 
because  Ricketts  and  Shannon  and  Howard  strongly  objected  to 
something  he  had  said  or  written,  and,  as  Whistler  insisted,  Ricketts 
and  Shannon  resigned  and  J.  attended  the  second  or  third  meeting. 
The  Society  got  on  extremely  well  without  them  and  their  return 
to  the  Council,  after  Whistler's  death,  resulted  in  the  loss  of  the 
Society's  international  character.  It  was  then  even  proposed  to 
make  it  a  Royal  International  Society.  Though  both  are  eminent 
artists,  they  were  in  complete  opposition  to  Whistler's  theories 
and  practise.  They  went  so  far  as  to  get  rid  of  some  of  Whistler'? 
etchings  which  they  had  collected  and  now,  they  probably  regret 
it  sincerely. 

Tuesday,  January  2Jth.  J.  to  see  Whistler  to  give  a  report  of 
the  committee  meeting  held  in  our  place  the  night  before.  The 
last  Nation  has  a  paragraph  about  Whistler  and  Canfield — some 
one  has  sent  us  a  paper,  The  N.  Y.  Sun,  with  a  long  account  of 
Canfield  and  his  flight  from  New  York,  a  leader  on  the  subject, 
and  a  burlesque  interview  with  Whistler  about  the  portrait. 
Canfield  denied  that  Whistler  is  painting  him,  it  seems,  but  J. 
found  he  had  been  there  that  afternoon  sitting,  was  still  there  when 
Sauter  arrived  a  little  earlier.  Whistler  asked  him  what  brought 
him  to  London.  Canfield  said,  no  other  business  but  to  sit  for  his 
portrait.  Whistler  talked  of  MacColl  and  his  visit.  The  Glasgow 
University  people  propose  to  confer  a  degree  on  Whistler  and 
MacColl  came  to  ask  if  Whistler  would  accept  it.  He  first  sent 
1903]  275 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

MacColl  upstairs  and  kept  him  waiting  there  a  bit,  of  course;  then? 
when  he  came  down,  told  him  he  had  not  time  just  then,  but  would 
MacColl  lunch  on  Sunday?  On  Sunday  again  MacColl  was  sent 
upstairs  and  given  Reynolds1  to  amuse  himself  with,  "the  paper, 
you  know,  you  always  want  to  see  but  are  ashamed  to  pick  up  at 
your  club,"  Whistler  told  him.  And  at  lunch  Whistler  wouldn't 
talk  about  art  but  insisted  on  talking  of  West  Point. 

Friday,  February  6th.  Went  to  Whistler's,  not  having  been  able 
to  get  there  before  for  some  weeks.  Found  him,  I  thought, 
looking  very  ill  and  coughing  dreadfully.  He  said  the  Doctor 
told  him  he  was  quite  another  man,  stronger  in  every  respect,  his 
pulse  good — he  was  wonderful.  Naturally,  Whistler  said,  but  he 
still  coughs  and  he  can't  sleep  at  night.  "Why  not?"  I  asked. 
"Well,  you  know,"  he  said,  "I  seem  to  have  lost  the  habit." 
Pawling  was  there  when  I  arrived.  When  he  left,  Whistler  spoke 
of  his  portrait  of  Mrs.  Heinemann.  "She  has  not  come  to  sit  and 
have  her  portrait  finished,  which  is  crime  enough  for  anything," 
he  said.  And  then,  Miss  Philip  coming  in  and  tea,  he  said  little 
more  about  anything  at  all. 

Tuesday,  February  loth.  J.  went  to  see  Whistler,  who  was  in 
rather  bad  form,  talked  little,  and  coughed  a  great  deal.  Canfield 
had  just  gone,  Sauter  still  there.  A  visit  with  nothing  to  report. 
Joseph  Gilder  now  writes  to  J.  to  ask  in  a  roundabout  way  about 
the  Canfield  affair.  Has  Whistler  been  working  in  London  or 
Paris?  he  asks.  J.  diplomatically  answers  that,  as  far  as  he  knows, 
Whistler  has  not  worked  in  Paris  for  the  last  three  or  four  years. 
Gilder  writes  back  that  what  he  wants  to  know  is  whether  he  has 
been  working  here  since  January?  J.  answers  that  he  is  afraid  he 
cannot  give  him  any  information  on  the  subject. 

Saturday,  February  nth.  A  letter  from  Whistler  asking  us  to 
come  and  see  the  Rosa  Corder.  It  has  just  been  bought  for 
America  and  is  in  his  studio  for  a  few  days  on  the  way.  J.  is  in 
Manchester,  and  I  go  down  in  the  afternoon.  I  find  Canfield  in 
the  studio — he  is  charmed  to  meet  me,  has  already  had  the  pleasure 
276  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

of  meeting  my  husband.  It  seems  it  is  he  who  has  bought  the 
picture  from  Graham  Robertson  and  he  wants  to  get  it  to  New  York 
in  time  for  the  spring  exhibition.  Whistler  has  been  all  day  clean 
ing  and  varnishing  it,  and  seems  exhausted.  Complains  of  cold 
and  draughts,  and  after  tea  rests  his  forehead  on  the  table  and 
falls  sound  asleep.  Miss  Philip  goes  upstairs  to  see  to  her  mother 
who  is  ill,  and  I  am  left  to  Canfield  who  plays  showman  and  host 
too.  Seems  to  be  running  the  whole  place — thinks  I  had  better 
not  wake  up  Whistler  to  say  good-bye;  he  will  make  all  my  excuses 
both  to  him  and  Miss  Philip. 

Saturday,  February  2ist.  J.  takes  Ives — back  in  London  to  see 
about  the  St.  Louis  Exposition — to  call  on  Whistler.  One  of  the 
lonides  is  there  and  Canfield.  There  is  not  much  talk.  Whistler 
consents  to  serve  as  Chairman  of  the  Committee  for  the  selec 
tion  of  work  by  American  artists  in  England.  A  more  or  less 
formal  visit. 

Ives  was  Halsey  C.  Ives,  the  distinguished  Director  of  the  Art 
Section  at  the  St.  Louis  Exposition.  J.  acted  as  the  American 
Secretary  in  England  with  Sargent  and  McLure  Hamilton.  Pro 
fessor  Ives,  at  this  Exposition,  arranged,  for  the  first  time  in  an 
international  show,  a  proper  British  representation  for  the  younger 
men  and  the  younger  societies. 

"One  of  the  lonides"  was  Whistler's  old  friend  Lucas,  or  Luke 
lonides  whom  he  had  known  from  his  Paris  student  days,  who 
helped  us  enormously  with  his  reminiscences  of  Whistler's  early 
years  both  in  Paris  and  London,  and  who  is  now  reported  to  be 
preparing  a  book  of  his  own. 

Thursday,  February  26th.  J.  goes  down  to  Whistler  to  tell  him 
about  the  Committee  meeting  held  here  last  night.  They  play 
dominoes  until  about  half  past  eight,  and  then  Whistler  insists  on 
keeping  J.  to  dinner.  He  seems  in  much  better  form,  but  likes 
dominoes  more  than  talk.  He  does  not  approve  of  Ives.  The  one 
amusing  story  he  tells  J.  is  of  the  evening,  not  long  before  his  illness, 
when  he  was  sitting  drinking  his  after-dinner  coffee  at  the  Carlton 
and  an  American  came  up  and  introduced  himself  by  saying,  "You 
1903]  277 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

know,  Mr.  Whistler,  we  were  both  born  in  Lowell,  Massachusetts, 
and  at  very  much  the  same  time.  There  is  only  the  difference  of 
a  year — you  are  sixty-seven  and  I  am  sixty-eight  1  I  put  up  my 
eye-glass,  looked  at  him,  laughed — Ha!  ha! — everybody  turned 
round — And  I  told  him — Very  charming!  And  so  you  are  sixty- 
eight  and  were  born  at  Lowell!  Most  interesting,  no  doubt,  and 
as  you  please.  But  I  shall  be  born  when  and  where  I  want,  and 
I  do  not  choose  to  be  born  at  Lowell,  and  I  refuse  to  be  sixty- 
seven!  Ha!  ha! — for  the  benefit  of  everybody  in  the  room  and 
the  complete  embarrassment  of  the  man  who  was  born  at  Lowell, 
Massachusetts." 

The  great  piece  of  news  was  the  birth  of  three  small  kittens, 
mother  and  family  are  established  in  the  studio. 

Too  much  has  been  said  of  Whistler's  adoption  of  a  birthplace  to 
suit  himself  for  us  to  go  over  it  again.  But  we  were  amused  when, 
looking  through  the  Whistler  vs.  Ruskin  legal  documents,  to  dis 
cover  that,  preparing  for  the  trial,  Maryland  was  his  vague  choice, 
though  a  catalogue  of  a  show  of  prints  at  the  Guildhall,  quoted 
by  the  lawyers,  stated  that  he  was  born  in  Russia. 

Sunday,  March  1st.  Whistler  telegraphed  us  to  come  to  see  the 
Rosa  Carder  for  the  last  time,  as  she  starts  for  America  on  Mon 
day,  and  to  bring  MacColl.  J.  don't  feel  especially  like  coming  and 
of  course  there  is  no  getting  MacColl  at  a  moment's  notice,  and 
so  I  go  alone  on  a  fearfully  stormy  afternoon.  Canfield  there, 
looking  over  lithographs  and  showing  off  the  Rosa  Corder  and  a 
little  pastel  of  mother  and  child  which  he  has  also  bought.  No 
one  else  but  Miss  Philip.  Whistler  better  and  more  like  himself. 
He  is  not  in  the  least  sleepy — he  slept  eight  and  a  half  hours  the 
night  before,  Miss  Philip  says.  The  kittens  are  shown  off. 
But  the  great  affair  is  the  letter  he  is  writing  to  acknowledge  the 
honour  the  University  of  Glasgow  has  conferred  upon  him  by  giving 
him  a  degree.  He  hands  to  me  the  letter  of  the  Principal  of  the 
University,  making  the  formal  announcement,  to  read,  then  his 
answer,  and  then  the  address.  Is  it  necessary,  with  D.D.  and 
other  letters  and  honours  after  his  name,  to  give  hinvthe  Rev. 
278  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

before  it,  the  Principal  being  a  clergyman?  I  hesitate  to  give 
advice,  as  these  things  may  be  different  in  Scotland;  anywhere 
else  I  should  have  thought  the  Rev.  necessary.  There  is  a  great 
debate.  Finally  the  letter  is  put  in  an  envelope  with  a  note  to 
the  Waltons  next  door  to  ask  them,  as  Scotch  themselves,  what 
they  think.  Presently  their  answer  comes  back,  that  another  still 
more  Scotch  Scotchman  who  happens  to  be  there  agrees  with  them 
in  thinking  that  he  is  right  in  suggesting  the  use  of  Rev.  before 
the  name.  A  diplomatic  answer,  and  the  great  affair  is  settled. 
We  talk  of  little  else,  and  there  was  no  mistaking  Whistler's  honest 
pleasure  in  the  degree. 

Canfield  left  a  little  before  I  did,  with  a  note  of  introduction  to  a 
lady  whose  name  I  did  not  hear,  who  owns  a  picture  by  Whistler 
the  title  of  which  I  did  not  hear,  but  which  Whistler  wants  Canfield 
to  buy.  What  might  the  lady  think  if  she  knew  who  Canfield  is? 
Whistler  says  he  has  worked  a  little  on  the  Rosa  Corder,  but  very 
little.  Has  washed  it,  however,  which  makes  all  the  difference  in 
the  colour,  for  it  was  very  dirty. 

Canfield  could  not  get  the  Valparaiso  he  wanted.  When  he  bought 
the  Rosa  Corder,  he  told  J.  he  went  to  see  the  young  man — Graham 
Robertson — and  offered  him  a  thousand  pounds  for  it,  which  the 
young  man  refused;  he  then  offered  two  thousand,  and  the  young 
man  jumped  at  it.  "Damned  fool!"  Canfield  added,  "I  would 
have  offered  five  thousand  and  jumped  at  the  chance  of  getting 
it  for  that." 

Canfield  was  certainly  good  to  Whistler  during  this  winter.  Not 
only  did  he  sit  for  his  portrait,  but  he  purchased  a  number  of  small 
works  and  many  lithographs  and  drawings.  These  were  exhibited 
in  Buffalo  later  by  Miss  Sage,  and  before  Canfield's  death  they 
were  dispersed.  Not  only  this.  Canfield's  knowledge  of  the 
concoction  of  cocktails  was  as  profound  as  Whistler's  and  J.'s 
appreciation  of  them.  He  was  a  curious  combination  of  sport  and 
culture,  and,  after  two  or  three  cocktails,  or  something  stronger, 
was  not  a  pleasant  personality.  But  Whistler  endured  him  because 
it  was  worth  while  and  always  spoke  of  him  as  "a  perfect  gentle 
man."  J.'s  position  was  difficult  as  all  this  while  we  were  pestered 
by  American  correspondents  wanting  to  know  if  Whistler  was 
painting  "gambler  Canfield" — wanting  also  to  know  his  where- 
1903]  279 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

abouts  which  were  being  asked  for  by  District  Attorney  Jerome 
in  New  York.  Finally,  one  day,  a  young  newspaper  man  arrived 
in  Buckingham  Street  and  asked  J.  if  it  really  was  so,  if  Canfield 
was  in  London  and  was  being  painted  by  Whistler.  J.  advised 
him  to  go  to  Whistler  and  find  out.  "And  do  you  think  he  would 
kick  me  downstairs?"  asked  the  correspondent.  "Well,  if  he 
did,"  said  J.,  "don't  you  think  that  would  add  to  the  interest  of 
your  story?" 

After  the  publication  of  our  book,  Canfield's  interest  in  us  suddenly 
ceased,  as  did  Freer's  for  that  matter.  It  is  not  safe  to  tell  the  truth 
about  some  American  collectors.  The  last  time  J.  saw  Canfield 
was  at  a  show  in  New  York  where  there  was  furniture  said  to  be 
decorated  by  Whistler.  Canfield  was  loudly  explaining  the  evident 
fact  that  the  paintings  on  the  furniture  were  not  by  Whistler  when 
he  saw  J.  He  left  the  room  so  rapidly  that  he  forgot  his  hat  and 
stick  and  they  had  to  be  sent  for.  This  was  our  last  encounter 
with  him,  though  later  he  tried  to  prevent  J.  from  even  consulting 
his  published  catalogue,  while,  writing  to  a  man  who  is  our  friend 
and  who  showed  us  the  letter,  he  declared  us  "monumental  in- 
grates,"  which  has  amused  and  puzzled  us  ever  since,  as  with  the 
exception  of  seeing  him  at  Whistler's,  and  endeavoring  to  get  a 
contribution  from  him  for  the  Whistler  memorial,  we  never  had 
anything  to  do  with  him. 

Sunday,  March  8th.  Dining  with  the  Fisher  Unwins.  Mrs.  Unwin 
says  that  Whistler  told  her  when  Canfield  first  wanted  to  buy 
the  Rosa  Corder  and  offered  fifteen  hundred  pounds,  Graham 
Robertson  would  not  hear  of  it.  Canfield  came  to  Whistler  in 
despair.  Whistler  told  hirn  to  make  out  a  cheque  for  two  thousand, 
take  it  with  him  and  go  back  and  show  it  to  Graham  Robertson, 
and  he  would  see,  and  Canfield  did.  He  handed  the  cheque  to 
Graham  Robertson  who  at  once  consented  to  let  him  have  the 
picture.  And  this  is  the  way  it  came  into  Canfield's  possession. 

Mrs.  Unwin's  story  about  the  Rosa  Corder  is  virtually  the  same 
as  Canfield's. 

Friday,  March  i$th.  Down  to  Whistler's.  He  was  not  very  well, 
said  he  was  coughing  and  I  must  do  the  talking.  Mrs.  Clara  Bell 
280  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

has  sent  him  proofs  of  her  book  and  he  is  awfully  upset  over  it. 
"It  won't  do  at  all — it  is  absurd  and  I  can't  have  it  go  as  it  is.  I 
suppose  I  must  go  over  the  proofs  and  correct  them."  "  But  why," 
I  asked,  "do  this  for  her — supply  her  with  the  facts  and  statements 
that  will  give  her  book  the  importance  she  could  not  give  it  herself 
— you  will  be  helping  her,  which  is  the  one  thing,  as  I  understand, 
you  do  not  want  to  do.  Besides,  the  Bells  will  announce  that  the 
text  has  been  revised  by  you,  and,  in  a  way,  you  will  find  yourself 
responsible."  He  was  awfully  worried,  I  could  see,  by  the  whole 
thing.  "Well,  perhaps,  I  will  have  her  down  to  lunch  and  talk 
it  over  with  her — I  really  do  not  know  what  to  do," — then  he  got 
me  to  read  the  proof  to  him.  He  was  indignant,  and  no  wonder, 
because  in  speaking  of  the  Little  Lady  Sophie,  she  said  that  as  a 
painter  of  the  portraits  of  children,  it  placed  him  with  Sargent 
and  Shannon!  And  also  because  she  referred  to  his  later  work  as 
if  it  were  not  so  fine,  which  is  against  his  theory  that  the  work  of 
the  true  artist  is  always  equally  good — "There  is  no  better,  no 
best." — she  is  a  re-echo  of  the  Wedmores  and  Humphry  Wards 
and  the  others  who  are  continually  pointing  out  the  comparative 
weakness  and  slightness  of  his  later  work.  I  looked  over  the  first 
few  chapters,  then  I  had  to  go — but  he  said  there  were  mistakes 
and  endless  confusion  through  the  others,  and  I  left  him  in  the 
depths  of  depression. 

Wednesday,  March  2$th.  To  Whistler's,  but  he  slept  the  entire 
time  I  was  there,  and  my  talk  was  solely  with  Miss  Philip. 
Nothing  to  report. 

Wednesday,  April  ist.  J.  went  down  to  see  Whistler.  Papers 
from  home  have  come  in  which  Canfield  denies  that  Whistler  is 
painting  him,  and  J.  found  Canfield  there  and  his  portrait  on  the 
easel.  After  Canfield  had  gone,  J.  referred  to  his  talk  with  Hartley 
and  the  suggestion  of  an  International  Show  at  Earl's  Court. 
Whistler  would  not  hear  of  it  at  first.  "It  would  be  a  dishonour 
to  art — to  be  shown  with  water  chutes  and  switchbacks  as  part  of 
the  entertainment!"  But  J.  explained  how  fine  it  would  be,  a  fine 
building,  everything  on  a  big  scale,  with  Hartley  to  finance  and 

281 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

run  it  on  big  lines,  and,  at  the  end,  Whistler  not  only  approved 
but  became  almost  enthusiastic. 

Hartley  is  Harold  Hartley,  then  managing  the  Earl's  Court  Exhi 
bitions.  His  interest  in  art  is  keen.  In  every  exhibition,  he 
included  an  art  section,  and,  in  the  course  of  his  management, 
brought  much  work  from  the  Continent  that  might  otherwise 
never  have  been  seen  in  London.  His  idea  was  to  give  the  large 
galleries  he  reserved  for  art  to  the  International,  to  decorate  them 
as  the  Council  might  direct,  and  in  every  way  to  give  this  exhibition 
the  dignity  and  distinction  Whistler  insisted  upon.  He  knew 
it  would  be  a  good  thing  for  Earl's  Court  and,  incidentally,  for 
the  International. 

Saturday,  April  nth.  To  Whistler's — I  was  shown  into  the  room 
upstairs  and  asked  to  wait — the  Master  wanted  very  much  to 
see  me.  I  suppose  I  waited  three  quarters  of  an  hour.  Then  I 
was  sent  for  to  the  studio.  With  his  hair  parted  in  the  middle  and 
plastered  down  on  either  side  of  his  face,  Whistler  looked  more 
forlorn  than  ever.  He  was  apologetic — his  French  barber  had 
been  with  him  and,  of  course,  he  had  to  finish.  The  performance 
exhausted  him,  and  I  wanted  to  go  at  once,  but  he  insisted  on 
hearing  all  about  A.'s  wedding.  So  I  gave  him  the  main  particulars, 
and  hurried  away,  he  looked  too  tired. 

A  great  deal  has  been  said  about  Whistler's  personal  appearance, 
especially  about  his  hair.  Over  and  over,  J.  was  with  him  when 
he  dressed  and  therefore  knows,  and  we  might  as  well  state  it 
once  and  for  all,  that  his  hair  was  not  grey  though  it  had  grey  in  it. 
And  it  was  not  dyed.  J.  has  seen  the  whole  performance  when  it 
was  arranged.  Whistler  would  dip  his  head  in  the  wash  basin  and 
bring  it  out  with  his  hair  hanging  down  in  long  locks  like  Louis 
Stevenson's,  or  an  Indian's.  In  Paris,  when  he  lived  at  the  Hotel 
Chatham,  a  maid,  or  a  masseuse,  dried  it  for  him.  When  he  dried 
it  himself,  he  rubbed  it  with  a  towel  and  ran  his  fingers  through  it, 
and  it  at  once  became  curly  again.  And  the  white  lock,  last  of  all, 
was  coaxed  and  curled  into  shape.  He  was  as  careful  of  his  hair 
as  of  his  work — of  everything, 

Friday,  April  ifth.  J.  to  Whistler's,  to  submit  to  him  the  menu 
for  the  International  Dinner — Whistler,  after  objecting  to  the 
282  [1903 


WHISTLER,  ABOUT  1878 

From  a  photograph  bound  in  S.  P.  Avery's  Copy  of  Sheridan  Ford's  Gentle  Art  of 
Making  Enemies 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

dinner,  and  upsetting  Council  and  Society,  is  now  altogether  inter 
ested.  He  approved  of  the  menu — added  but  one  suggestion  which 
was  typical:  that  the  salad  should  be  a  Romaine,  with  next  to  no 
vinegar  in  the  dressing! 

This  is  one  of  the  many  details  that  show  how  near  to  him  were  the 
affairs  of  the  International  and  how  carefully  he  worked  for  it. 
It  shows  moreover  his  respect  for  the  art  of  dining.  If  he  gave  a 
dinner  he  studied  the  menu  as  carefully  as  he  studied  his  palette 
when  he  painted  a  picture.  By  an  odd  chance  a  proof  of  this 
turned  up  in  the  Ruskin  case  documents — a  rough  bit  of  paper 
with  a  note  on  it  in  his  handwriting  suggesting  the  menu  for  the 
dinner  he  gave  his  Counsel  and  Solicitor  in  the  White  House  at  the 
end  of  the  trial.  Here  it  is,  a  curious  intimate  little  record:  "Potage 
Paysanne;  Turbot;  Compote  de  Pigeons;  Gigot  de  Mouton-haricot; 
Alouettes  en  canape;  Mince  Pie;  Compote  de  Pommes;  cafe"  The 
International  dinner  was  held  this  year  in  the  Cafe  Royal,  and  the 
Austrian  and  Belgian  Ambassadors  and  several  other  distinguished 
guests  were  invited,  for  the  International  then  was  the  Interna 
tional  Society  it  called  itself.  If  J.  remembers,  Rodin  attended  on 
this  occasion  and  speeches  were  made  by  Maurice  Hewlett  and 
men  as  prominent.  Whistler's  idea  was  that  these  annual  dinners 
should  become  as  important  as  the  dinners  of  the  Royal  Academy, 
and  they  would,  and  the  Society  would  have  eclipsed  that  institu 
tion,  had  he  lived.  It  happened  curiously  that  he  was  never  able 
to  attend  any  one  of  the  annual  dinners,  but  his  interest  in  them, 
as  in  all  the  work,  great  or  small,  of  the  Society,  continued  to  the 
last.  This  year  he  was  annoyed  because  nothing  was  made  in  the 
papers  of  his  absence.  Lavery,  the  Vice-President,  as  always  when 
he  was  absent,  took  his  place.  Whistler,  however,  did  attend  many 
of  the  informal  Council  dinners  held  at  the  Cafe  Royal.  To  one 
of  these  Sir  James  Guthrie  came  up  from  Edinburgh  especially  to 
express,  on  behalf  of  the  Council,  his  belief  and  that  of  the  Council 
in  Whistler,  their  allegiance  to  him,  their  willingness  to  support 
him,  and  their  faith  in  his  art  and  his  theories.  It  was  one  of  the 
finest  tributes,  for  Sir  James  Guthrie  is  an  orator  as  well  as  an 
artist,  ever  paid  by  a  body  of  artists  to  an  artist  whom  they 
recognized  as  their  master  and  loved  as  their  friend. 

Monday,  May  4th.  To  Whistler's.  He  met  me  with  a  reproof. 
"Well,  you  know,  was  that  your  note  about  the  International 
Dinner  in  this  morning's  Chronicle?"  "Yes."  "How  could  you 
1903]  283 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

make  no  reference  to  the  President's  absence,  the  one  fact  of 
importance?"  "No  excuse,"  was  my  answer,  because  I  did  not 
want  to  tell  him  that  Fisher  complains  of  my  forever  dragging  the 
name  of  Whistler  into  my  Chronicle  articles.  He  was  tired — I 
always  strike  his  bad  days.  He  could  not  keep  his  eyes  open  and 
finally  put  his  head  down  on  the  table,  his  forehead  resting  on  it, 
and  went  to  sleep.  Mrs.  Whibley  was  there  and  we  talked  on. 
Every  now  and  then  he  waked  up  to  say, /'What  was  that?"  just 
when  we  would  rather  he  had  not  been  listening.  And  once  it  was 
to  say,  so  pathetically,  to  Mrs.  Whibley,  "You  are  not  Agoing  to 
leave  me,  Bunny.  Must  you  really  go  away  today?"  Nothing 
has  made  me  feel  so  much  the  loneliness  and  dulness,  for  him,  of 
the  life  he  is  now  forced  to  lead.  I  stayed  only  a  short  time  after 
this,  and  I  left  him  sleeping. 

Fisher  is  W.  J.  Fisher,  then  editor  of  The  Daily  Chronicle.  This 
question  of  dragging  in  Whistler,  this  objection  to  his  very  name, 
among  so-called  art  critics  and  other  outsiders  was  and  is  always 
recurring.  Mr.  Fisher  was  more  liberal  than  many  editors,  but 
could  not  ignore  his  subscribers.  So  seldom  does  an  artist,  or  any 
other  man,  happen  in  whom  his  friends  and  his  followers  absolutely 
believe  that  the  average  person,  who  never  had  a  friend,  neither 
understands  nor  knows  anything  about  true  faith,  true  friend 
ship.  There  have  been  examples  of  this  sort  of  faith  in  the  world. 
Whistler  inspired  devotion  and,  in  return,  gave  his  friendship  to 
those  he  knew,  those  he  trusted.  And  because  they  supported 
and  believed  in  him,  outsiders  speak  of  his  friends  as  idolaters  who 
never  criticised  him.  These  friends  did  criticise  Whistler's  work 
to  his  face  and  he  accepted  their  criticism,  sometimes  with  damag 
ing  results.  But  their  criticism  and  their  statements  that  they 
did  not  approve  of  all  his  work  are  ignored  by  a  gang  who  cannot 
understand  and  who  could  not  tell  the  truth  if  they  did.  At  the 
time  of  the  Whistler  Memorial  Exhibition  in  London,  E.  had  a 
curious  example  of  this  determined  misunderstanding  on  the  part 
of  the  critics.  Just  before  it  opened, 

February  loth,  1905,  at  a  press  view  of  Le  Sidaner's  work  in  the 
Goupil  Gallery,  I  ran  across  Humphry  Ward.  He  wrote  the  Art 
Criticisms  of  the  London  Times  and  thereupon  was  accepted  by 
284  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

the  public  as  an  authority.  To  him  I  expressed  a  hope  that 
he  was  interested  in  the  coming  Whistler  show.  "Well,"  he 
said,  "you  have  worked  the  press!"  As  if  I  took  it  personally, 
I  said  I  hadn't,  but  the  press  seemed  to  have  the  sense  to  realize 
that  it  was  something  to  be  interested  in.  "I  never  saw  anything 
like  it,"  was  his  answer.  "You  all  seem  to  look  upon  Whistler  as 
God  Almighty,  the  Three  Persons  of  the  Trinity  rolled  into  one." 
"No,"  I  told  him,  "we  are  far  more  interested  in  him  than  if  he 
were  God  Almighty,  for  we  look  upon  him  simply  as  the  most  dis 
tinguished  artist  of  recent  years."  The  end  of  it  was,  he  supposed 
he  might  give  the  show  a  little  of  his  condescending  attention.  But 
his  manner  suggested  disappointment  that  Whistler  ventured  to 
become  so  famous  though  he  had  never  predicted  it.  ...  He  was 
at  the  private  view,  on  February  22nd,  the  one  critic  who  stuck 
to  his  colours  and  remained  indifferent.  He  bore  down  upon  me 
to  ask  why  I  appeared  in  such  sombre  colours  on  so  triumphant 
an  occasion — "Why  I  expected  to  find  you  in  white  and  garlanded !" 

Another  amusing  meeting  was  with  George  Moore  the  day  the 
Exhibition  closed: 

April  ist,  1905.  George  Moore  was  at  the  show,  had  come  over 
from  Paris  expressly  for  it.  Scribners  had  asked  him  to  write  an 
article.  Cut  he  felt  he  had  written  enough,  though  there  were 
some  things  in  the  chapter  in  his  book  he  would  like  to  change. 
Now  he  felt  more  as  if  he  might  write.  He  had  thought  before 
coming  that  another  look  at  The  Piano  Picture  would  be  unendur 
able  and  that  he  would  not  be  able  to  stand  seeing  those  legs  in 
the  Miss  Alexander  again.  But  now  he  had  come,  the  old  spell 
was  over  him  once  more,  and  things  seemed  more  wonderful 
than  ever. 

Thursday,  May  iflh,  1903.  J.  to  Whistler's  and  with  his  usual 
luck  struck  one  of  his  good  days.  He  was  gay,  had  been  working — 
he  showed  J.  the  portrait  of  Canfield:  What  did  he  think  of  it? 
J.  thought  it  very  fine,  one  of  his  finest  portraits,  but  suggested 
that  the  hand  was  prominent,  took  away  from  the  interest  of  the 
1903]  285 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

head  in  such  a  small  half-length,  or  rather  head  and  shoulders. 
"  Oh  well  now!  it  is  just  like  you  1"  But  in  the  end,  Whistler  thought 
there  might  be  something  in  it,  and  he  would  think  about  it.  And 
then  they  played  dominoes,  and  he  kept  J.  to  dinner,  and  a  goose 
berry  tart  made  him  apologize  in  the  old  way  for  "the  Island," 
and,  altogether,  J.  found  him  like  himself  again. 

J.  often  hesitated  to  criticise  details,  and  so  did  most  of  Whistler's 
friends,  because  Whistler  never  asked  for  criticism  save  from  those 
he  really  wished  to  criticise  his  work,  and  then  he  had  a  way 
of  taking  criticism,  acting  on  it,  and  getting  into  messes  in  conse 
quence.  The  portrait  of  Canfield  was  at  that  time  wonderfully 
fine,  but  when  we  saw  it  later,  we  think  in  Paris,  it  was  ruined. 
It  was  not  sold  with  the  rest  of  Canfield's  collection,  we  believe, 
but  was  bequeathed  to  his  son.  We  saw  it  again  recently  at 
Knoedler's.  E.  A.  Walton  is  one  artist  who  felt  as  we  did  about 
Whistler  and  criticism.  Talking  with  us  over  the  months  when  he 
lived  next  door  to  Whistler  in  Chelsea,  he  said, 

February  igth,  1906,  he  was  sure  Miss  Philip  made  a  mistake  in  al 
ways  praising  Whistler's  work  and  always  wanting  everybody  else 
to  praise  it.  She  was  indignant  with  him  once  when  he  happened 
not  quite  to  like  something  Whistler  had  just  painted.  But  he  knew 
Whistler  preferred  to  hear  the  truth,  would  rather  have  you  say 
what  you  thought  than  get  off  the  usual  commonplaces.  Some 
years  ago,  in  Whistler's  studio  with  Lavery,  Whistler  showed  them 
a  portrait  he  was  doing  and  asked  their  opinion.  Walton  started 
to  criticise,  but  Lavery  interrupted,  "Oh!  Mr.  Whistler,  we  would 
not  venture  to  criticise  your  work!"  Whistler,  however,  paid  no 
attention  to  Lavery  but  made  Walton  say  what  he  had  begun  to 
say,  and  then  argued  it  out  with  him,  just  as  any  other  artist  would 
have  done.  We  know  for  ourselves  how  little  Whistler  liked  the 
"O  Great  Master!"  attitude— the  "O  splendid!  O  wonderful!" 

Another  day  in  May,  of  which  there  is  no  note — E.  was  in  Paris — 
J.  went  to  Chelsea  and  Whistler  was  just  like  himself.  He  put  his 
arm  in  J.'s,  walked  him  across  the  studio,  and  then  turned  him 
round.  And  there  on  the  easel  was  the  marvellous  rendering  of 
Miss  Seton  with  the  apple.  "Hm,  hm,  when  do  you  think  I  did 
286  [1903 


THE  LAST  MONTHS 

that?"  J.  said  he  did  not  know.  "O,  you  never  know.  When 
did  I  do  it,  Major?"  he  asked  Miss  Philip.  "This  afternoon," 
she  said.  "And  how  long  did  I  take?  About  two  hours?"  "No, 
it  was  an  hour  and  three  quarters."  It  was  as  fine  as  the  Little 
Rose  or  any  of  the  other  small  studies — a  masterpiece,  and  J.  told 
him  so.  "Hm,  hm,  guess  we'll  have  a  cocktail."  He  made  them. 
And  they  played  dominoes.  And  some  of  the  dominoes  had  curious 
tell-tale  marks  on  their  backs,  or  bumps  on  their  faces,  and  some 
how  he  always  got  them,  and  somehow  he  always  won,  which 
delighted  him  and  everybody  else.  J.  does  not  remember  if  he 
stayed  on  to  dinner,  but  he  remembers  too  well  that  the  next  time 
he  saw  the  picture,  it  was  ruined.  Whistler's  everlasting  desire 
to  get  something  better  when  what  he  had  got  was  perfect,  was  his 
curse  and  his  salvation.  In  all  these  later  pictures  he  seemed  con 
scious  of  something  he  thought  he  could  improve.  These  to  whom 
he  showed  them  knew  they  were  wonderful.  But  he  saw  something 
beyond,  something  more  to  add,  and  these  last  days  his  hand  did 
not  respond  when  he  tried  to  repaint  what  he  had  done.  For  the 
work  on  one  small  spot  meant,  as  always,  working  over  the  whole 
canvas  to  keep  the  skin  of  it  right.  The  tragedy  was,  and  he  felt 
it,  that  he  could  no  longer  do  this,  and  when  he  endeavoured  to, 
he  failed.  And  it  saddened  him.  He  said  one  day,  "There  is  so 
much  to  do  and  so  little  time  to  do  it." 

Thursday,  May  28th,  1903.  I  went  to  see  Whistler,  but  had  hardly 
got  there  and  begun  to  talk  and  to  look  at  a  portrait  of  Miss 
Philip  which  he  started  some  months  ago,  and  is  now  making  into 
the  most  beautiful  portrait  of  her  I  have  seen — a  blue  gown  with 
dull  yellow  beads  about  her  neck — when  his  barber  was  announced. 
He  had  been  fearfully  nervous  about  the  arrival  of  the  barber — 
perhaps  there  was  not  time  for  us  to  have  tea  served  in  the  studio — 
perhaps  there  was — so  I  said  good-bye  with  no  talk  of  any  kind 
worth  remembering. 

There  is  a  big  gap  here,  J.  and  E.  were  away.  Also,  at  times,  no 
notes  were  made  or  we  have  not  used  them — others  have  been 
used  in  the  Life  and  we  do  not  repeat  them.  And  for  us  Cheyne 
Walk,  Chelsea,  except  in  a  cab,  was  not  an  easy  place  to  get  to, 
the  nearest  underground  was  Sloane  Street,  the  nearest  bus  an 
hour's  ride,  King's  Road,  and  from  both  a  long  walk.  And  finally 
it  was  usually  a  sad,  sad  place  to  go  to  in  the  end,  growing  sadder 
every  day. 
1903]  287 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Thursday,  June  4th.  J.  went  to  see  Whistler  but  brought  me 
nothing  special  to  note. 

Wednesday,  June  loth.  To  Whistler's — he  was  fairly  awake,  lis 
tened  to  everything  I  said,  but  with  nothing  to  say  himself 
except  to  worry  about  his  cough,  the  shut  windows,  the  open  win 
dows,  the  coming  of  the  Doctor  for  whom  he  had  sent.  He  has 
never  yet  seemed  so  nervous  about  himself — though  I  thought 
him  less  tired  than  usual — and  so  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  make 
a  short  visit  and  leave  him. 

Thursday,  June  nth.  J.  to  Whistler's  on  International  busi 
ness.  Whistler  objected  to  Lavery's  accepting  the  invitation 
from  the  Royal  Academy  to  serve  on  the  Committee  for  the 
British  Art  Section  at  St.  Louis  and  J.  wanted  to  try  and  persuade 
him  to  change  his  decision.  But  it  was  one  of  his  bad  days — he 
didn't  seem  to  take  the  least  interest — and  for  the  first  time  J. 
admitted  that  he  was  pretty  bad. 

Tuesday,  June  2jrd.  J.  lunched  with  Lavery  to  meet  Macau- 
lay  Stevenson,  who  gave  him  three  good  Whistler  stones  that 
I  don't  think  I  have  heard  before.  Some  one  told  him  of  a 
portrait  of  Lord  Roberts  painted  by  Mortimer  Menpes  in  half  an 
hour:  "Very  slow  exposure,"  said  Whistler.  When  Stott  died  a 
friend  came  in  to  tell  him  the  news.  "Stott  died  at  sea,"  was  the 
announcement.  "  Where  he  always  was,"  was  Whistler's  comment. 
When  the  authorities  at  Glasgow  decided  to  buy  his  Carlyle,  a 
deputation  of  two  or  three  came  to  him  with  the  cheque  lor  a 
thousand  pounds  in  their  pocket.  But  they  offered  him  eight 
hundred.  Whistler  refused.  "Now  think  it  over,  Mr.  Whistler, 
and  we  will  be  coming  back  again."  And  so  they  did,  the  next 
day.  "And  now,  what  have  you  been  thinking,  Mr.  Whistler?" 
"Of  nothing,  gentlemen,  except  the  pleasure  of  seeing  you  again!" 
And  they  gave  him  the  cheque  for  one  thousand. 

The  thousand,  though  Whistler  treated  it  so  lightly,  came  at  a 
most  opportune  moment.  He  had  not  been  married  long,  he  was 
288  [1903 


THE  LAST  DAYS 

more  than  usually  hard  up,  he  was  deep  in  debt  again.  But  first 
he  invested  a  large  part  of  it  in  old  silver  for  he  was  beginning  to 
replace  the  beautiful  things  sold  at  the  bankruptcy.  Somehow, 
his  creditors  got  wind  of  it,  pounced  upon  him,  and  in  a  fortnight 
not  a  penny  of  the  thousand  pounds  was  left. 


CHAPTER  XVII  :  THE  LAST  DAYS.  THE  YEAR  NINE 
TEEN  HUNDRED  AND  THREE  CONTINUED 

Wednesday,  July  1st,  1903.  To  Whistler's.  The  maid  said  he 
would  see  me,  but  Miss  Philip  sent  word  I  had  better  not  stay  long 
as  he  was  tired.  He  was  in  bed,  distinctly  worse,  with  a  curious 
vague  look  in  his  eyes,  all  the  life  gone  out  of  them.  He  said  noth 
ing  and  seemed  almost  in  a  stupor,  though  he  must  have  been 
listening,  for  every  now  and  then  he  interrupted  to  ask,  "What's 
that?"  The  only  two  things  he  said  were  characteristic.  Miss 
Philip  told  me  he  had  not  been  able  to  eat  for  the  last  few  days, 
and  the  Doctor  ordered  turtle  soup,  and  they  had  got  it  at  the 
correct  place  in  the  City — Birch's — "Shocking,  shocking,"  said 
Whistler,  apparently  with  reference  to  nothing  in  particular.  But, 
after  a  minute  or  two,  when  I  had  almost  forgotten,  he  added, 
"We  all  live  in  the  City  now."  Then  when  I  left,  naturally  in 
about  ten^minutes,  and  told  him  I  must  go,  he  said,  "No  wonder 
you  want  to  go  from  a  house  where  they  don't  give  you  anything 
to  eat!"  I  had  refused  when  Miss  Philip  wanted  to  get  tea  for  me. 
When  she  came  to  the  door  with  me,  she  did  not  seem  more  alarmed 
than  usual,  though  it  looked  to  me  as  if  he  could  not  have  more 
than  two  or  three  weeks  at  the  most  to  live.  She  only  said 
she  wished  they  would  not  bother  him  about  the  International. 
Lavery,  the  last  time  he  came,  would  talk  business  though  she 
warned  him,  and  Whistler  was  exhausted  by  the  excitement. 

All  the  details  of  these  last  tragic  days  were,  in  our  opinion,  of 
importance  and  to  be  recorded,  and  we  used  them  in  the  Life. 
As  an  absurd  misconstruction  was  put  upon  our  use  of  Whistler's 
reference  to  his  house  as  "one  where  they  don't  give  you  anything 
to  eat,"  let  us  say,  and  be  done  with  it,  that  this  was  pathetically 
characteristic  of  Whistler.  His  was  the  most  hospitable  of  houses, 
1903]  289 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

and  he  and  Miss  Philip  never  failed  in  their  hospitality.  But  at 
such  a  moment  E.  would  never  have  allowed  them  to  trouble  to 
get  tea  for  her,  and  it  touched  her  deeply  that  Whistler,  ill  as  he 
was,  barely  conscious,  could  still  remember  what  he  considered 
his  duties  as  host  and  feel  that  something  was  wanting  in  the  wel 
come  he  gave  her.  It  is  still  a  keen  regret  to  J.  that  work  took  him 
from  London  at  the  end  of  June  and  that  he  did  not  return  until  the 
day  before  Whistler's  death.  E.  also  was  away  off  and  on  in  June. 

Monday,  July  6th.  To  Whistler's.  The  Doctor  was  with  him, 
and  I  waited  almost  an  hour  upstairs  with  Mrs.  Whibley.  Then 
he  sent  for  me  to  the  studio.  He  was  up  and  dressed,  had  been 
out  driving.  But  he  looked  worse  than  last  week,  his  eyes  vaguer 
and  more  dead,  giving  one  the  impression  of  a  man  in  a  stupor  and 
he  said  not  a  word,  while  I  did  my  best  to  interest  him,  describing 
Loubet's  arrival  at  Victoria.  Finally,  Miss  Philip  asked  him  if  he 
were  tired.  I  had  been  there  not  more  than  ten  minutes.  He  said 
yes,  and  so  I  told  him  I  must  go.  And  yet,  when  he  said  good-bye, 
the  one  thing  he  added  was  characteristic:  "You  are  looking 
very  nice!" 

Loubet  was  then  President  of  the  French  Republic  and  his  arrival 
in  London  was  one  of  the  early  incidents  of  that  Entente  Cordiale 
which  the  English  cultivated  so  assiduously.  From  a  friend's 
window  in  Victoria  Street,  E.  had  watched  the  ceremonial  with 
which  "the  Islanders"  received  him,  and  then  hurried  on  to 
Whistler's,  sure  that  this  was  one  of  the  little  things  that  he  would 
love  to  hear  and  ready  for  his  never-failing  ridicule  of  "the 
Islanders"  in  any  role.  But  he  was  far  beyond  jesting  or  even  the 
glimmer  of  interest. 

Thursday,  July  Qth.  Duret  and  Kennedy  dined  with  me. 
Duret  had  been  that  morning  to  see  Whistler,  and,  like  me,  he 
thought  Whistler  seemed  in  a  stupor — he  could  hardly  speak  and 
found  his  words  with  difficulty;  no  one  without  a  clue  could  have 
understood  what  he  was  talking  about.  Duret  was  overcome;  some 
of  the  best  hours  of  his  life,  he  said,  were  spent  with  Whistler.  .  .  . 

Sunday,  July  I2th.  Kennedy  came  in  to  read  me  a  letter  from 
Dunthorne  who  was  at  Whistler's  yesterday  and  reports  him 
290  [1903 


THE  LAST  DAYS 

distinctly  worse,  hardly  able  to  talk,  unable  to  look  at  prints,  his 
hands  swollen,  which  in  heart  disease,  Kennedy  says,  is  a  bad 
sign — a  sign  of  the  end.  Miss  Philip,  after  a  little,  told  Dunthorne 
it  was  better  to  go  and  to  come  back  on  Monday.  Dunthorne 
wanted  him  to  identify  certain  prints,  but  it  was  useless. 

Tuesday,  July  i^th.  To  Whistler's:  the  Doctor  was  with  him, 
but  he  asked  me  to  wait  and  I  went  upstairs  with  Mrs. 
Whibley,  who  seemed  hopeful.  In  about  ten  minutes  he  sent  for 
me.  He  was  dressed,  in  the  studio,  and  pictures  were  on  the  easels. 
He  seemed  distinctly  better,  though  his  face  was  as  sunken  and 
his  eyes  as  vague.  But  he  talked.  When  I  told  him  he  looked 
better  and  asked  him  how  he  felt,  he  answered  with  all  his  old 
gallantry,  "I  only  wish  I  felt  as  well  as  you  look."  He  asked  for 
news,  what  of  Henley,  had  I  heard  anything?  I  spoke  of  the 
Sauters  who  came  in  to  see  us  a  few  evenings  before.  They  were 
in  our  neighborhood  for  a  lecture  which  they  found  impossible  and 
came  to  us  instead,  I  said  their  energy  was  wonderful,  they  were 
ready  to  do  anything,  to  go  everywhere  they  were  asked.  "Not 
so  much  energy,  perhaps,"  Whistler  said,  "as  not  knowing  how  to 
put  in  their  time."  The  little  mother  cat,  lately  banished  from 
the  studio,  was  running  round  again,  and  she  jumped  in  my  lap, 
rubbing  her  face  up  and  down  against  mine.  "She  remembers 
you,"  Whistler  said.  Altogether,  he  was  like  another  man,  or 
rather  like  himself  again,  especially  when  Miss  Philip  brought  him 
a  cup  of  chicken  broth.  He  was  in  a  fury  at  the  sight  of  it.  "I 
suppose  I  must  take  the  damned  thing — excuse  the  word,"  turning 
to  me,  "but  it  must  be  said."  And  he  scolded  in  a  voice  as  strong 
as  ever.  How  did  they  expect  him  to  have  an  appetite  for  his 
dinner?  they  never  gave  him  a  chance,  they  were  always  making 
him  take  something,  he  had  no  peace,  every  hour  it  was  something 
until  of  course  he  did  not  want  his  dinner.  Miss  Philip  looked  as 
if  her  nerves  were  giving.  She  poured  him  out  a  cup  of  tea  instead, 
and  went  in  the  next  room  for  a  minute.  Every  now  and  then  his 
eyes  closed,  but  he  was  interested  in  everything,  and  when  Lavery 
was  announced  told  the  maid  to  show  him  in,  and  asked  me  why 
1903]  291 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

I  was  going  so  soon  when  I  got  up  to  say  good-bye.  But  I  was 
afraid  that  to  have  Lavery  and  myself  both  there  would  be  too 
much  for  him.  Mrs.  Whibley  and  Miss  Philip  came  to  the  door 
with  me  and  they  seemed  encouraged.  The  Doctor  said  the  heart 
was  all  right. 

Henley,  about  whom  he  asked,  had  died  but  a  few  days  before, 
and  Whistler  was  anxious  to  know  what  we  knew  of  his  death,  and 
of  the  funeral  to  which  Whistler  had  sent  a  great  spray  of  purple 
iris.  We  are  afraid  Whistler  did  not  make  an  easy  patient.  His 
illness  would  not  have  seemed  so  tragic  had  he  resented  it 
less  bitterly. 

Wednesday,  July  i$th.  Duret  came  in  after  dinner.  He  had  been 
down  to  see  Whistler  again  and  again  was  shocked  at  Whistler's 
condition.  He  was  there  an  hour,  and  he  could  see  that  Whistler 
wanted  to  talk  and  was  struggling  to  find  the  words.  Whistler 
showed  him  some  of  his  etchings  at  Spithead,  and  was  glad  to  have 
Duret  recall  the  old  days.  But  it  was  clear  there  were  other  things 
he  wanted  to  say  and  could  not,  and  Duret  left  him  feeling  it  was 
the  last  time  he  would  see  him.  Duret  talked  to  us  of  those 
old  days.  .  .  . 

Saturday,  July  i8th.  When  I  came  down  to  breakfast,  I  opened 
a  letter  from  Fisher:  "Why  did  you  not  let  me  know  of  the 
death  of  Whistler?"  He  died  suddenly  yesterday  afternoon. 
Fisher  asked  us  to  write  an  appreciation.  We  had  hardly  settled 
down  to  work  when  Lavery  arrived.  He  had  been  to  the  house, 
had  seen  Miss  Philip.  He  had  suggested  that  all  the  Society  should 
go  to  the  funeral.  She  thought  perhaps  it  would  be  better  if  only 
the  Council  went.  It  was  not  yet  decided  when  the  funeral  would 
be.  Mr.  Freer  was  seeing  to  everything  for  them.  Lavery  wants 
a  meeting  called  for  Monday  to  see  about  sending  flowers  and  other 
details.  His  idea  is  that  the  Society  should  give  up  next  winter's 
Exhibition  to  Whistler,  but  this  is  something  not  even  to  be 
spoken  of  until  later  on.  Then  a  telegram  from  The  Star  ask 
ing  for  an  article.  After  lunch,  Sauter  came,  as  I  was  starting 
for  Chelsea. 
292  [1903 


THE  LAST  DAYS 

As  I  was  shown  in  the  house,  Freer  was  coming  out  of  the  studio, 
wearing  a  rather  professional  air  of  grief.  He  could  tell  me  nothing. 
He  got  to  the  house  the  afternoon  before  at  half  past  three,  and 
everything  was  over.  Mrs.  Whibley  joined  us — Miss  Philip  asked 
to  be  excused — and  we  sat  in  the  hall.  On  Thursday,  she  said,  he 
seemed  so  well.  He  went  out  driving  with  Mr.  Freer.  Then, 
after  he  came  back  he  sat  talking  to  her  for  a  long  while,  and  he 
and  Miss  Philip  and  she  played  dominoes  together.  The  three 
dined  in  the  studio,  and  she  told  him  he  was  so  much  better,  before 
long  he  would  be  dressing  again  for  dinner.  Anyway,  she  said, 
never  at  any  time  had  he  been  as  bad  as  last  summer  at  The  Hague. 
Friday  morning  Mrs.  Lawson,  who  had  sat  up  with  him,  said 
that  he  passed  a  fairly  good  night  and  Mrs.  Whibley,  who  was 
tired,  did  not  go  down.  But  after  lunch  they  called  her.  She  saw 
at  once  the  attack  was  serious,  the  Doctor  was  sent  for,  she  and 
Miss  Philip  were  with  him,  and  as  I  understood,  it  was  over  before 
the  Doctor  got  to  the  house.  With  him,  it  seemed  to  her,  as  with 
all  people  with  whom  she  has  been  at  the  last,  that,  dying,  he  saw 
something  the  living  could  not  see.  The  time  for  the  funeral  is 
not  yet  arranged,  but  the  service  will  be  held  at  old  Chelsea  Church, 
the  church  to  which  he  used  to  take  his  mother.  As  I  left,  a  brisk 
youth  "representing  the  American  press"  made  his  appearance 
asking  for  information. 

A  cablegram  from  The  Century  saying,  "Reserve  Whistler  remin 
iscences."  Kennedy  and  little  Brown  came  in  the  afternoon  to 
find  out,  if  possible,  about  the  funeral,  and  Kennedy  stayed  to 
dinner,  broken  up  because  when,  on  Thursday,  after  more  than  a 
year,  he  called  on  Whistler,  Whistler  was  out  and  Miss  Philip 
would  not  see  him,  though  she  saw  Dunthorne  who  was  with  him. 
Duret  dropped  in  later  on,  tragic  in  his  sorrow.  Whistler  was  his 
last  friend — all  the  others  had  gone.  Now,  in  Paris,  he  is  alone. 
If  he  goes  out  on  the  Boulevards,  he  goes  by  himself.  He  is  left 
without  friends.  .  .  . 

J.  heard  of  Freer  from  another  source.  Back  in  London  on 
the  afternoon  of  the  i/th,  he  went  to  the  Art  Workers'  Guild  in 
1903!  293 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

the  evening  and  there  met  T.  R.Way.  The  meeting  is  recorded  in 

The  Journal  a  few  days  later: — 

Thursday,  July  23rd.  Uneventful,  but  must  remember  to  put 
down  what  I  did  not  at  the  time.  When  J.  went  to  the  A.  W.  G. 
on  Friday,  he  found  T.  R.  Way  in  frock  coat  and  top  hat.  so  un 
usual  a  sight  that  J.  asked  him  what  it  meant.  Way  said  he  had 
been  lunching  with  Freer  who  wanted  to  see  him  about  the  litho 
graphs — Freer  had  left  him  to  go  and  take  Whistler  a  drive.  And 
so,  while  Whistler  was  dying,  Freer  was  giving  a  lunch  to  the 
"enemy." 

All  along,  J.  had  told  Whistler  he  refused  to  fight  with  Way 
because  Way  was  useful  to  both  of  them,  just  as  he  refused  to  take 
up  Whistler's  business  aifairs  with  Way,  at  the  time  of  the  quarrel 
which  involved  the  bill  for  lithographs,  and  he  advised  Whistler 
to  get  Webb  to  see  to  it.  The  bill  for  merely  some  two  hundred 
pounds  covered  an  enormous  amount  of  work.  Way  turned  over 
to  Webb  all  the  stones  with  drawings  on  them,  Whistler  paid  the 
bill  and  got  the  best  of  the  bargain,  but  he  refused  to  see,  or  have 
anything  to  do  with  the  Ways,  father  and  son,  from  then  until  the 
day  of  his  death. 

Sunday,  July.ipth.  Lavery  in  the  evening.  He  wanted  to  know 
if  we  had  heard  the  date  of  the  funeral.  But,  like  evenyone 
else,  we  know  nothing.  He  told  us  Guthrie  was  coming  up  from 
Scotland,  he  was  always  devoted  to  Whistler,  though,  at  first, 
Whistler  distrusted  him,  was  not  sure  of  him.  But,  gradually, 
Whistler  began  to  understand  how  genuine  Guthrie  was  In  his 
devotion.  Guthrie  got  him  the  LL.D.  in  the  Glasgow  University, 
which  is  interesting  to  hear  as  MacColl  gave  us  to  understand  that 
it  was  his  doing.  .  .  . 

Monday,  July  20th.  Began  the  day  with  a  telegram' from  Ken 
nedy  asking  when  the  funeral  was  to  be — still  we  did  not  know. 
Heinemann  sent  for  J.,  said,  of  course,  the  arrangement  for  the 
book  held  good.  But  nothing  could  be  done  until  the  family  was 
consulted  or  it  was  known  who  were  the  executors,  and  there  for 
the  moment  the  matter  rests.  At  lunch,  Wilson  came  in,  he  also 
294  [I9°3 


THE  LAST  DAYS 

wanting  to  know  when  the  funeral  was  to  be.  He  told  us  of  a 
wonderful  Chinese  cabinet  from  Whistler's  studio  bought  by  his 
brother-in-law  at  the  sale.  Somehow  or  other  the  top  got  mis 
placed,  and  long  afterwards  Whistler,  chancing  on  it  in  some  old 
shop,  bought  it  no  doubt  for  a  good  price,  and  brought  it  in  a  cab 
straight  to  Wilson's  brother-in-law,  that  the  cabinet  might  be 
complete  as  a  thing  so  beautiful  should  be.  Then  Hartrick  turned 
up.  Spoke  of  the  evening  he  met  Whistler  here  and  the  wonderful 
form  Whistler  was  in,  telling  stories  about  Rossetti,  imitating 
Rossetti's  voice.  .  .  . 

Miss  Gilder  called  in  the  afternoon  to  ask  if  she  could  make  with 
J.  the  arrangement  she  has  made  with  Gosse  and  Archer:  to  use 
any  signed  article  he  may  have  in  The  Daily  Chronicle  for  The 
Critic — she  does  not  pay  much,  but  as  there  is  no  copyright  any 
one  who  chooses  could  steal  the  work  and  pay  nothing.  She  wanted 
The  Daily  Chronicle  article  about  Whistler  for  the  September 
Critic.  Then  Brown,  with  Pollitt,  called  to  ask  about  the  funeral. 
No  one  knows  and  everybody  is  anxious.  I  learn  from  Brown  that 
other  people  besides  ourselves  think  the  notice  in  Saturday's  Times 
shocking.  Abbey  is  indignant.  Heinemann  answered  it  but 
thought  it  best  to  tear  up  his  letter.  Holme  of  The  Studio  asks 
J.  to  help  him  find  Whistlers  for  an  "important  publication"  he 
is  bringing  out!  which  is  funny,  but  business-like. 
A  Council  meeting  of  the  International,  the  funeral  is  to  be  on 
Wednesday,  the  service  in  old  Chelsea  Church  at  eleven,  and 
interment  at  Chiswick.  They  arranged  to  send  a  wreath,  write 
to  the  family,  send  round  notices. 

The  cabinet  is  the  one  referred  to  in  The  P addon  Papers.  We  have 
told  the  story  in  the  Life.  Pollitt  is  Mr.  A.  J.  Pollitt  of  whom 
Whistler  painted,  in  the  Fitzroy  Street  studio,  a  portrait  which 
was  destroyed.  After  E.'s  call  in  Chelsea,  we  were  not  only  not 
asked  to  the  house  but  kept  in  ignorance  of  the  arrangements  for 
the  funeral  and  everything  else,  as  were  all  his  friends — Heinemann, 
Lavery,  Sauter,  Duret. 

Tuesday,  July  2ist.  Notices  of  the  funeral  at  last  in  the 
papers.  Dell,  having  written  to  J.  that  he  would  like  an  article 
1903]  295 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

about  Whistler  for  the  September  number  of  The  Burlington, 
lunched  with  us  to  talk  it  over.  He  wants  an  appreciation  of 
Whistler's  art,  so  it  ought  not  to  interfere  with  The  Century,  and 
J.  promises  to  let  him  know,  suggesting  for  August  an  article  about 
the  man  by  W.  M.  Rossetti,  one  of  the  few  old  friends  left.  In  the 
afternoon  a  visit  from  Fisher  Unwin  asking  about  the  funeral — 
it  is  incessant — and  after  dinner  Duret  and  Strang  and  David 
Strang.  Poor  Duret  again  told  me  that  he  had  no  friends  left. 
He  brought  me  a  copy  of  the  Matin,  with  the  best  French  notice  I 
have  seen,  and  told  me  the  quotations  from  Whistler's  Propositions 
for  the  Academic  were  from  his  translation  made  at  Whistler's 
request.  He  kept  repeating  his  loss:  first  Manet,  then  Zola,  now 
Whistler — all  great  men.  Spoke  of  the  book  he  was  writing,  said 
it  would  be  entirely  of  Whistler's  art,  and  he  would  try  and 
reproduce  in  it  the  things  that  are  not  so  well  known.  .  .  . 
Letter  of  condolence  from  Gosse.  McLure  Hamilton  and  Wynford 
Dewhurst  write  to  ask  us  to  send  them  the  best  notices.  One 
would  think  we  ran  a  sort  of  Whistler  agency. 

Wednesday,  July  22nd.  The  funeral — J.  went  early  with  the 
International.  I  took  Augustine.  Later  than  I  meant  to  be.  It 
was  five  minutes  to  eleven  when  I  reached  the  church  and  I  ex 
pected  to  find  it  crowded,  but  it  was  perhaps  not  half  full.  Mrs. 
Dr.  Whistler,  with  Mrs.  Thynne  and  Miss  Thynne  in  deep  mourn 
ing  in  a  pew  a  little  in  front  of  me.  Saw  various  people — little 
Brown;  D.  C.  Thomson;  a  pew  of  Academicians,  Alma-Tadema  and 
East  among  them;  Mrs.  Abbey;  Charles  Whibley,  his  brother-in- 
law,  in  a  pew  in  the  side  aisle;  Heinemann  with  Dr.  Chalmers 
Mitchell  coming  in  later.  Joseph  s-aw  Mrs.  Heinemann  and 
Mortimer  Menpes — but  the  names  are  all  in  the  papers.  At  last 
the  funeral  procession.  The  coffin  was  carried  the  short  distance 
from  the  house  to  the  church.  The  men  staggered  under  it  as  they 
walked  up  the  aisle,  the  purple  velvet  pall  any  which  way,  owing 
no  doubt  to  difficulty  of  passing  the  font  at  the  entrance;  then  the 
pall-bearers;  then  the  Philip  family — the  five  sisters,  the  brother, 
young  Godwin,  young  Lawson;  then  Webb,  the  Doctor,  and  Studd, 
296  [1903 


HOUSE  WHERE  WHISTLER  DIED  AND  CHELSEA  CHURCH    FROM    WHICH 

HE  WAS  BURIED 

ETCHING 

By  J.  Pennell 


THE  LAST  DAYS 

and  immediately  after,  as  if  part  of  the  procession,  Brandon 
Thomas  and  his  wife,  who  came  in  the  pew  with  me.  The  clergy 
man  has  a  dull,  emotionless  voice,  and  as  he  reads  lessons  and 
prayers,  the  beautiful  burial  service  is  not  in  the  least  impressive, 
neither  so  simple  as  to  be  solemn  in  its  simplicity,  nor  so  fine  in  its 
formality  as  to  be  dignified  with  the  dignity  Whistler  loved.  The 
procession  re-forms,  the  Council  of  the  International  fall  in  behind 
and  the  people  follow  in  carriages  and  hansoms  provided  by  them 
selves,  but  not  many.  At  Chiswick,  J.  says  a  crowd  evidently  is 
expected  for  numbers  of  policemen  form  round  the  funeral  party 
as  if  to  protect  it,  but  there  are  few  people.  Miss  Philip  walks  to 
the  grave  and  looks  in  with  calm,  expressionless  face.  The  Inter 
national  Council  are  given  a  place  close  to  the  grave.  A  man  in 
blue  monocle,  red  coat,  blue  shirt,  orange  flower  in  buttonhole, 
fur  cap,  long  fur  edged  gloves,  comes  leaping  over  the  graves  like 
some  strange  uncanny  monster.  The  clergyman  takes  off  his 
biretta,  mumbles  the  prayers  as  if  in  haste  to  get  through  with 
them.  Miss  Kinsella  crouches  on  the  grass,  crying  audibly.  And 
all  is  over.  But  the  graveyard  is  calm  and  beautiful,  the  grave 
under  a  wall  covered  with  clematis. 

In  the  confusion  of  coming  away,  J.  finds  himself  in  a  carriage  with 
Studd,  who  explains  how  he  happened  to  be  with  the  family.  They 
had  asked  him  to  be  a  pall-bearer,  but,  at  the  last  moment,  as  a 
favour  begged  him  to  make  way  for  Duret.  It  is  to  be  noted  that 
among  the  pall-bearers — George  Vanderbilt,  Freer,  Abbey,  Guthrie, 
Lavery,  and  Duret — there  are  three  Americans,  one  Scotchman, 
one  Irishman,  one  Frenchman,  and  no  Englishman.  It  is  also  to 
be  noted  that  not  an  art  critic  is  present  in  the  church.  A  wreath 
of  gold  bay  leaves,  one  of  the  only  two  wreathes  on  the  cofHn,  was 
sent  by  the  International.  When  J.  reached  the  church,  no 
arrangement  had  been  made  to  reserve  seats  for  anybody,  and 
only  by  his  instructions  to  the  verger  were  pews  reserved  for  the 
International  Council  and  friends.  He  lunched  at  the  Hyde  Park 
Hotel  with  the  others  of  the  Council,  to  talk  over  a  Whistler 
Memorial.  Howard,  in  a  moment  of  inspiration,  suggested  a 
gallery.  Sauter  was  in  a  state  of  indignation  because  the  funeral 
1903]  297 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

was  so  little  impressive,  anywhere  else  ti^would  have  been  an 
official  occasion,  the  chief  authorities  represented,  the  military  out. 
Indeed,  all  the  Societies  and  Academies  to  which  Whistler  belonged 
should  have  been  represented  and  they  probably  would  be  very 
indignant  because  they  had  not  been. 

This  completes  The  Whistler  Journal,  from  the  day  of  our  first 
talk  after  he  asked  us  to  write  his  Life  three  years  before,  until 
the  day  of  his  funeral — but  only  to  the  day  of  his  funeral.  The 
end  is  not  yet,  nor  will  be  as  long  as  we  live.  Whistler's  fame 
grows  with  the  years,  and  we  feel  it  our  duty  to  leave  as  full  a  record 
as  we  can  of  the  great  Master  it  was  our  privilege  to  know.  His 
fame  endures,  increases.  None  shall  prevail  against  it. 


298  [1903 


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APPENDIX  I:  WHISTLER  AS  A  DECORATOR 

Whistler's  genius  as  a  decorator  is  seen  in  every  picture,  in  every 
drawing  he  made,  though  this  was  not  realized  in  his  lifetime. 
When  he  came  to  live  in  London,  the  Pre-Raphaelites,  with  William 
Morris  as  their  business  man,  had  set  the  fashion  in  decoration  and 
they  maintained  that  their  work  alone  was  decorative  because 
they  painted  as  the  painters  before  Raphael  painted.  But  Cimabue 
and  Giotto  and  the  illuminators  painted  and  drew  what  they 
thought  they  saw,  and  so  were  realists.  The  greatest  decorator  who 
ever  lived,  Pierodella  Francesca — from  whom  the  Pre-Raphaelites 
might  have  learned  had  they  had  the  brains  and  the  ability,  from 
whom  Puvis  de  Chavannes  did  learn,  from  whom  future  artists 
will  learn — was  the  greatest  of  realists.  Whistler,  who  believed  not 
in  going  back  but  in  carrying  on,  was  as  intent  as  the  early  Italians 
upon  painting  what  he  saw  as  he  saw  it,  and  he  relied  upon  the 
proper  placing  of  his  subject  within  the  frame,  the  distribution  of 
his  spaces  and  his  lines,  to  obtain  perfect  balance,  perfect  propor 
tion,  perfect  repose,  and  so  produce  a  Harmony,  a  Symphony,  an 
Arrangement — a  decoration.  His  tides  explain  his  methods,  the 
results  prove  that  he  was  right,  that  there  is  as  true  decoration  in 
his  Falling  Rocket  as  in  Botticelli's  Spring,  though  in  this  as  in 
much  of  his  early  work  he  followed  the  Japanese.  But  this  was 
not  understood  by  his  contemporaries — is  hardly  understood  now 
— and  he  gave  no  help  in  his  answer  to  doubters:  "I  am  not 
arguing  with  you;  I  am  telling  you." 

To  complete  the  decoration,  Whistler  designed  the  frames  for  his 
paintings  and  prints.  He  and  his  assistants  decorated  them  with 
patterns  which,  for  a  while,  he  derived  from  the  Japanese  and  other 
Orientals.  Each  was  different,  for  each  was  suggested  by  the  pic 
ture  it  enclosed,  though  the  same  feeling  ran  through  all.  Later  he 
gave  up  these  painted  frames  and  adopted  one  now  known  as  "the 
Whistler  frame,"  which  has  become  a  standard.  It  was  gold — 
green  or  red,  not  glaring — with  reeded  lines  for  his  oils,  water- 
colours  and  pastels;  white,  sometimes  with  blue  or  purple  lines  or 
patterns,  for  his  etchings  and  lithographs.  His  frames  and  his  can 
vases  were  of  definite  sizes,  with  the  result  that  for  every  canvas 
there  was  always  a  frame  that  fitted.  He  went  further.  He  in 
sisted  that  the  painter  must  also  make  of  the  wall  upon  which  his 
work  hung,  the  room  containing  it,  the  whole  house,  a  Harmony, 
a  Symphony,  an  Arrangement,  as  perfect  as  the  picture  or  print 
which  became  a  part  of  it. 

299 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

This  may  be  to  us  today  a  simple  truth,  but  it  was  looked  upon  as  a 
pose,  an  affectation,  at  the  period  when,  as  Whistler  said,  "for  the 
flock  little  hamlets  grew  near  Hammersmith, "  and  sad  people  wore 
sad-coloured  garments  and  sat  in  Early-English  chairs,  and  ate 
beef  and  greens  off  sham  Italian  majolica,  and  drank  British  beer 
out  of  sham  Venetian  glass,  and  covered  their  walls  with  Morris 
tapestries  or  wallpapers  so  gorgeous  that  the  pattern  killed  the 
Rossettis  and  Burne-Joneses  alone  considered  worthy  of  the  back 
ground,  "if  the  work  was  not  already  lost,  in  the  gloom  or  glitter  of 
Pre-Raphaelite  stained  glass  windows.  As  we  look  back  to  out  first 
years  in  England,  it  seems  to  us  that  we  never  so  well  understood 
the  inappropriateness  of  it  all  as  when  we  saw  Morris  in  his  blue 
flannels,  a  picturesque  but  wholly  modern  figure,  stamping  up  and 
down  the  sham  mediaeval  rooms  of  his  real  Georgian  house  at 
Hammersmith.  Whistler  had  no  sympathy  with  this  sort  of  thing. 
He  never  tried  to  live  out  of  his  time,  and  he  could  not  stand  the 
stupidity  of  treating  a  drawing  room  in  a  small  Mayfair  house  as  if 
it  were  a  hall  in  a  great  mediaeval  castle.  He  was  as  simple  as 
Morris  was  elaborate,  though  he  did  not  at  once  achieve  simplicity 
in  decoration  any  more  than  he  at  once  succeeded  in  painting  with 
the  liquid  colour  of  the  nocturnes.  There  was  always  growth. 
He  took  his  first  Chelsea  house  in  1863  when  his  interest  in  Japanese 
art  was  at  its  height,  and  he  filled  his  rooms  with  screens  and  lac 
quer,  arranged  his  blue-and-white  on  shelves,  hung  prints,  fans, 
kakemonos  and  plates  on  his  walls.  Beautiful  use  of  the  screens  is 
made  in  the  Princesse  du  Pays  de  la  Procelaine,  beautiful  use  of  the 
detail  in  the  Lange  Leizen.  A  Japanese  fan  is  in  the  hand  of  The 
Little  White  Girl,  and  Japanese  pots  on  the  mantel  against 
which  she  leans.  Blue-and-white  fills  the  corner  cupboard  In  the 
Studio.  But  though  he  always  kept  the  blue-and-white  in  his  dining 
room,  he  soon  gave  up  this  scheme  of  decoration,  probably  because 
he  saw  what  it  led  to  when  borrowed  by  "the  thing  without"  who 
stuck  cheap  "  Japanesisms  "  all  over  their  houses  for  no  better  reason 
than  to  be  in  what  they  thought  the  fashion.  How  deeply  he  felt 
the  beauty  of  Japanese  design,  and  how  willing  he  was  to  use  it, 
we  know  from  the  nocturnes  with  the  spray  of  leaves  trailing  across, 
or  out  of  the  foreground,  just  where  a  Japanese  artist  would  have 
placed  it. 

But  he  gave  this  up  too,  realizing  that  the  Japanese  were  wrong,  as 
the  design  did  not  keep  within  the  frame.  Even  in  the  earliest  days, 
no  matter  how  much  ornament  was  in  his  rooms,  a  flat  wash  of 
colour  was  on  the  walls.  In  his  second  Chelsea  house,  he  painted 
the  petals  of  flowers  on  the  dado  of  the  stair-case  and  conventional 
300 


WHISTLER  AS  A  DECORATOR 

ships  with  sails  spread  on  the  panels  of  the  hall.  But  in  the  rooms, 
pattern  never  disturbed  the  simple  wall  spaces  delicately  flushed 
with  colour.  After  this,  there  was  never  pattern  anywhere.  He 
preferred  colour  that  would  make  his  rooms  bright  and  gay,  the 
first  essential  in  London  where  often  all  is  dark  and  dreary  with 
out.  He  kept  his  colour  flat  so  that  pictures  and  prints  would  tell 
upon  it  and  not  have  to  struggle  with  it.  Distemper  gave  him 
what  he  wanted,  but  plain  paper  could  be  used.  For  distemper  he 
mixed  the  colours  himself,  only  too  well  aware  that  no  house-painter 
could  get  the  right  tone  though,  once  he  had  mixed  it,  any  house- 
painter  could  put  it  on.  He  always  thought  and  said  that  art  has 
nothing  to  do  with  the  people,  and  yet  it  was  from  the  houses  of  the 
people  rather  than  the  palaces  of  the  few,  that  he  derived  the  idea 
of  walls  washed  simply  with  simple  tones,  of  dark-stained  floors, 
of  light  or  dark  dados  and  doorways  contrasting  with  the  walls. 
His  simple  washes  of  distemper  were  the  outgrowth  of  whitewash 
that  the  people  have  always  used,  a  development  of  the  beauty 
he  had  seen  in  the  quiet  old  houses  of  New  England,  that  we  have 
seen  in  the  houses  of  Friends  in  Philadelphia. 

Morris  preached  art  for  the  people  and  would  run  up  a  bill  for 
five  thousand  dollars  in  decorating  a  room  and  making  it  so  precious 
that  the  owner  hardly  dared  to  go  into  it.  Whistler  upheld  the 
aristocracy  of  art,  and  at  the  cost  of  about  five  dollars  would 
arrange  a  room,  beautiful  in  its  simplicity  and  appropriateness,  that 
could  be  used  without  fear,  since  it  could  be  done  over  again  in 
a  day. 

He  astonished  artists  who  toiled  in  the  complicated  splendours  of 
huge  studios  by  creating  masterpieces  in  a  small  bare  room.  The 
scheme  in  grey  and  black  of  No.  2  Lindsey  Row  was  the  background 
of  the  Mother,  the  Carlyle,  the  Miss  Alexander.  Mrs.  Leyland  stood 
in  the  flesh-colour  and  yellow  drawing  room  and  he  designed  her 
gown  to  harmonize  with  it.  For  this  and  other  portraits,  not  only 
the  colour  scheme  but  the  drapery,  the  minor  details  of  sash  and 
bows  and  rosettes,  were  of  his  designing,  and  the  many  studies  in 
chalks  on  brown  paper  which  he  made  for  them,  remain.  With 
him  it  was  not  a  question  of  rigging  up  a  corner  as  it  is  with  the 
artistic  photographer  and  the  swell  portrait  painter.  Every  room 
was  an  arrangement  and  every  sitter  had  to  fit  in.  At  times,  the 
arrangement  was  suggested  by  a  visitor  as  when  Rosa  Corder,  in 
brown  dress,  passed  one  of  his  black  doors  and  he  immortalized 
her.  Eventually  he  suppressed  the  background  in  most  of  his  por-> 
traits  and  the  figures  stand  in  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  saw 
them.  But  this  atmosphere  was  obtained  not  as  painters  usually 

301 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

get  it,  by  letting  all  the  daylight  they  can  into  their  studios,  but 
by  excluding  it  with  curtains  and  shades.  The  early  studios  had 
no  skylight.  A  figure,  thus  in  shadow  against  a  simple  wall,  takes 
its  place  in  the  atmosphere  that  surrounds  it.  Sometimes,  to 
accentuate  the  figure,  he  hung  behind  it  a  piece  of  drapery  of  the 
colour  he  wanted. 

Whistler  liked  his  windows  big.  His  curtains  were  sometimes  of 
flowered  chintz  but  oftener  of  white  muslin  without  pattern.  Of 
course  there  were  shades  in  the  studios.  On  the  floor  he  had  a  few 
rugs,  in  the  old  days  Chinese  or  Japanese;  later  matting,  which  he 
designed  in  harmony  with  the  colour  scheme.  His  furniture  was 
simple  in  form.  The  first  artists  and  artificers  who  built  palaces, 
he  said  in  his  Ten  o'clock,  "filled  them  with  furniture  beautiful  in 
proportion."  He  designed  a  few  pieces;  had  he  been  encouraged 
by  commissions  he  would  have  done  more.  Besides  the  sideboard 
of  The  Peacock  Room,  we  have  seen  only  the  great  blue  screen  with 
the  gold  moon  in  the  sky,  done  for  Leyland  and  kept  for  himself 
and  the  cabinet  with  his  decorations  designed  by  E.  W.  Godwin  for 
the  1878  Paris  Exposition  and  now  owned  by  Mr.  Pickford  Waller. 
Towards  the  end,  Whistler's  preference  was  for  the  furniture  he 
called  Empire.  The  white  and  gold  went  well  with  the  room. 
There  was  little  of  it.  He  had  no  patience  for  contrivances  for 
lounging  in  the  drawing  room.  "When  you  wanted  to  lounge," 
he  said,  "the  time  had  come  to  go  to  bed."  His  extravagance  was 
in  detail.  He  ate  off  the  blue-and-white  porcelain  which  he  not 
only  collected,  but  made  drawings  for.  Unfortunately,  Murray 
Marks  never  carried  out  the  scheme  and  only  the  drawings  exist. 
Whistler's  beautiful  silver  was  chosen  for  form,  not  for  rarity. 
"The  most  beautiful,"  he  used  to  say,  "was  Sheffield  plate,  de 
signed  by  artists  who  were  refugees  from  France  and  still  clumsily 
copied  by  Britons,  and  you  could  find  all  these  beautiful  things 
in  Wardour  Street  under  the  eyes  of  the  Islanders  who  had  not 
been  taught  to  see  them."  His  table  linen  was  marked  with  the 
Butterfly.  He  demanded  perfection  in  detail,  and  rather  than 
be  without  it,  would  leave  rooms  unfurnished.  "Besides,"  he  said, 
"  perfection  is  death. " 

When  Whistler  wished,  and  conditions  justified  it,  he  could  be  as 
gorgeous  as  he  was  usually  simple.  He  had  only  one  chance,  The 
Peacock  Room,  but  in  it  he  showed  th^  full  measure  of  his  powers  as 
decorator — the  wonderful  room  with  its  blue  on  gold  and  gold  on 
blue,  the  peacocks  flaunting  their  gold-and-blue  plumage  on  walls 
and  shutters  and  ceiling — the  one  decoration  of  Leyland's  much- 
decorated  house  that  lives.  As  decoration,  it  is  unapproached  in 
302 


CABINET  DECORATED  WITH  PAINTED  PANELS 

By   Whistler 
Owned  by  P.  R.  Waller,  Esq. 


SKETCH  FOR  SIDEBOARD 

PEN  DRAWING 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress 


SKETCH  FOR  ROSETTES 

CHALK 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress 


SKETCH  FOR  MATTING 

CHALK 

Pennell   Collection,    Library  of   Congress 


WHISTLER  AS  A  DECORATOR 

modern  times,  and  yet  nobody  gave  Whistler  the  opportunity  to 
rival  it.  He  hoped  to  make  this  opportunity  for  himself  in  the 
White  House.  Godwin  was  the  architect  but  there  is  no  doubt  that 
Whistler  was  the  designer,  and  it  is  the  one  house  he  ever  owned. 
But  he  moved  into  it  at  the  agitated  moment  of  the  Ruskin  trial 
and  moved  out  before  a  year  had  passed,  at  the  more  agitated 
moment  of  his  bankruptcy,  and  when  the  house  was  bought  at  the 
sale  by  Harry  Quilter,  "history,"  he  said,  "was  wiped  from 
the  face  of  Chelsea."  Therefore,  what  he  might  have  done  in  a 
house  of  his  own  designing  we  shall  never  know.  The  decoration 
of  the  houses  he  lived  in  grew  simpler  until  there  was  nothingonthe 
walls,  except  at  times  one  of  his  own  paintings  over  the  mantel  in 
the  drawing-room,  and  in  the  dining  room  the  beautiful  blue-and- 
white  on  shelves  or  in  cupboards  and,  hanging  from  the  ceiling,  the 
Japanese  bird  cage  above  a  blue-and-white  stand  and  bowl.  This 
is  another  crime  alleged  against  him  by  artists,  for  by  his  example 
he  has  stopped  intelligent  people  from  hiding  their  walls  behind 
bad  pictures. 

In  the  houses  he  decorated  for  his  friends  he  was  as  restrained  as  in 
his  own  and  as  careful  to  mix  the  colours,  ever  distrustful  of  the 
British  workman.  "Why  on  earth  should  the  workmen  think  for 
themselves  ? "  he  once  asked  Mrs.  Dr.  Whistler,  when  with  two  coats 
of  yellow  on  white  they  made  her  walls  crude  and  glaring,  though 
he  had  ordered  one  coat  of  yellow  on  grey,  knowing  that  the  result 
then  "would  have  been  fair  and  at  the  same  time  soft  and  sweet." 
He  kept  the  furniture  as  simple  as  in  his  own  house,  or  simpler, 
using  tables  and  cane-bottomed  chairs  painted  in  harmony  with 
the  general  scheme.  We  remember  one  drawing-room  in  which 
there  was  a  divan  covered  with  linen  of  the  same  tint  as  the  walls, 
and  on  the  mantel,  as  the  only  ornament,  a  row  of  little  white 
glasses  for  the  flowers  that,  change  as  they  might  with  the  season, 
would  never  strike  a  discordant  note. 

Whistler  had  no  factory,  no  shop,  no  staff  of  salesmen  and  workmen; 
he  was  not  in  the  business  as  William  Morris  was.  But  as  a  decor 
ative  authority,  Morris  has  grown  old-fashioned,  while  Whistler 
has  become  a  power.  Little  by  little  the  beauty  of  the  houses  and 
studios  he  arranged  for  himself  and  his  friends  began  to  be  seen,  and 
because  they  were  simple  and  beautiful,  those  who,  seeing,  could 
understand,  knew  they  were  right,  and  began  to  copy  them,  until 
now  his  scheme  of  simplicity  in  decoration  has  spread  all  over  the 
world.  Everywhere  you  find  studios  from  which  tapestries  and 
armour  and  bric-a-brac  have  been  banished;  everywhere  rooms 
with  the  walls  washed  or  papered  in  a  flat  tint  and  only  a  few 

303 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

paintings  or  prints  hanging  upon  them,  with  dark  painted  or 
stained  floors,  a  few  rugs  or  matting,  with  little  furniture  and  all 
of  it  simple;  the  result  is  by  no  means  invariably  right;  it  is  in  such 
houses  that  "the  something  on  the  mantleshelf  gives  the  whole 
show  away."  Colours  mixed  by  Whistler  are  one  thing;  colours 
mixed  by  manufacturers  and  artless  artists  are  another,  and  in 
art,  as  in  literature,  everything  depends  upon  quality. 
Whistler's  influence  has  been  as  marked  in  picture  galleries.  It  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  every  well-arranged  artistic  exhibition  in 
Europe  today  owes  its  inspiration  to  him;  in  America,  we  regret, 
the  art  of  picture  hanging  is  hardly  known  and  has  hardly  been 
practised  save  in  two  or  three  Whistler  exhibitions  held  since 
Whistler's  death,  and  then  not  altogether  successfully.  When  he 
began  to  exhibit,  galleries  were  decorated  any  how  and  pictures 
hung  as  close  as  they  could  be  fitted  from  floor  to  ceiling,  artists 
caring  little  how  they  were  hung  so  long  as  their  work  was  on  the 
walls.  When  he  sent  to  the  Academy  and  other  exhibitions  over 
which  he  had  no  control,  he  had  to  accept  the  conditions)  but  in 
exhibitions  over  which  he  had  control,  he  could  impose  them.  "A 
beautiful  picture  should  be  shown  beautifully,"  he  said;  "there 
fore  it  must  be  hung  so  it  can  be  seen,  with  plenty  of  wall- 
space  round  it,  and  in  a  room  made  beautiful  by  colour,  by  sculpture 
judiciously  placed,  by  furniture  and  decorations  and  hangings  in 
harmony."  In  his  studio  he  would  never  show  more  than  one 
picture  at  a  time,  never  letting  it  be  seen  until  it  was  in  its  frame  and 
on  the  easel.  But  he  understood  that  the  reason  for  having  pic 
tures  in  a  gallery  was  to  exhibit  them,  and  he  sent  as  many  as  he 
could,  so  as  to  produce  an  effect.  It  is  well  to  point  this  out,  for 
his  practice  in  his  studio  has  been  misunderstood  by  some  of  his 
admirers  and  imitators.  As  early  as  1874,  the  arrangement  of  his 
first  exhibition  seemed  revolutionary  to  a  public  debauched  by  the 
Academy.  Always,  the  colour  of  the  wall,  either  painted  in  a  flat 
tone  or  hung  with  cheese  cloth,  gave  the  keynote  for  the  harmony — 
Yellow  and  White,  Brown  and  Gold,  Flesh  Colour  and  Grey — 
which  set  the  foolish  public  laughing.  Sometimes  the  man  at  the  door 
became  part  of  the  scheme,  as  at  the  exhibition  of  the  second  series 
of  his  Venetian  etchings,  when  he  appeared  in  yellow-and-white 
livery  and  was  nicknamed  in  derision, "The  Poached  Egg."  This 
was  the  exhibition  when  the  public  rejoiced  in  ridiculing  Whistler's 
yellow  socks  and  the  assistants'  yellow  neckties,  and  when  Whistler 
presented  his  friends  with  Butterflies  of  yellow  silk  to  wear  at  the 
Private  View.  He  adapted  the  ancient  velarium  to  the  modern 
gallery,  arranging  it  so  that  the  spectators  were  all  in  shadow  and 

304 


DESIGN  FOR  SILK  BUTTERFLIES  WORN  AT  PRIVATE  VIEW 

WASH 

In  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Wickham  Flower 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  THE  BUTTERFLY 

PEN-AND-INK 

Pall  Mall  Magazine 
(See  page  306) 


WHISTLER  AS  A  DECORATOR 

the  pictures  all  in  light,  the  light  falling  upon  them  alone.  As  he 
said,  "Picture  galleries  lighted  at  the  top  are  very  good  for  the 
spectators  but  not  for  the  pictures,  for  the  falling  light  is  reflected 
up  from  the  floor  on  to  the  pictures  so  that  they  cannot  be  properly 
seen. "  The  velarium  is  a  translucent  screen,  the  edges  of  which  are 
allowed  to  hang  down,  placed  some  two  or  three  feet  below  the 
skylight  of  the  gallery.  The  light  therefore  falls  upon  the  pictures 
alone,  and  everything  under  the  velarium  is  in  shadow.  To  the 
British  Artists  it  was  so  alarming  as  to  be  a  reason  for  getting  rid  of 
Whistler.  Ten  years  later  it  was  accepted  gladly  by  the  Inter 
national  Society  of  Sculptors,  Painters  and  Gravers.  Another  of 
Whistler's  innovations  was  to  remove  the  staring  exhibition  number 
from  the  corner  of  the  picture,  where  generations  of  stupid  painters 
had  stuck  it,  to  the  wall  beside  the  picture  where  his  system  of 
hanging  left  sufficient  space.  As  a  result  of  all  this  care,  the  gallery 
became  a  beautiful  room,  showing  the  work  on  the  wall  to  the  finest 
advantage.  His  arrangement  of  galleries  has  been  imitated  on  the 
Continent,  though  not  always  intelligently.  In  many  a  German 
secession  Whistler's  ideas  have  run  riot  and  gone  mad,  while  when 
the  velarium  is  used  it  is  usually  without  understanding. 
Whistler  designed  his  invitation  cards,  his  posters,  and  his  cata 
logues.  He  introduced  the  Butterfly  on  the  first  invitation  card  in 
1874,  and  used  the  brown  paper  cover  for  the  catalogue  of  the  same 
exhibition.  But  it  was  with  his  next  exhibition,  in  1881,  that  he 
evolved  the  style  of  the  catalogue  to  which  he  adhered,  with  in 
creased  refinement,  until  the  last  of  all — the  square,  brown-paper- 
covered  catalogue,  in  size  and  shape  like  his  first  pamphlet,  Art 
and  Art  Critics,  issued  in  1878,  and  his  last,  the  Ten  0 'Clock,  in  1888. 
The  trouble  he  took  over  his  pamphlets  and  catalogues  is  almost 
unbelievable,  and  he  gave  no  less  to  his  letters — margins  ample, 
the  division  into  paragraphs  symmetrical,  punctuation  effective, 
the  Butterfly  where  it  told. 

It  is  curious  to  compare  his  books  with  those  of  William  Morris, 
who  went  back  to  the  past,  copying  old  books  without  considering 
his  time.  But  in  Whistler's  books  there  is  nothing  of  the  past  save 
tradition,  nor  are  they  toys  for  the  rich,  as  the  Kelmscott  books  are. 
Legible  type  and  well-leaded  page  make  easy  reading,  and  Whistler 
published  his  books  to  be  read,  not  to  be  hidden  in  bookcases.  He 
added  to  the  effect  by  the  spacing,  the  punctuation,  the  Butterflies, 
and  each  Butterfly  was  designed  to  explain  the  text  to  which  it  re 
ferred.  His  title-pages,  however,  might  have  gained  from  the  com 
pactness  in  the  Kelmscott  books. 

20 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Morris  thought  that  illustrations  must  be  decorative  and  he  pub 
lished  none  that  were  not  imitations  of  old  wood  blocks.  For 
Whistler  there  could  exist  no  form  of  art  that  was  not  decorative, 
but  neither  was  any  form  of  decoration  to  be  achieved  by  going 
back.  His  illustrations  are  few  and  in  these  few  he  was  true  to  his 
belief  of  carrying  on  tradition.  In  the  series  he  contributed  to 
Once  A  Week  and  Good  Words,  he  was  no  more  subservient  to  the 
methods  of  other  days  than  in  his  etch'ngs.  More  important  was 
his  series  for  the  Catalogue  of  Blue  and-  White  Nankin  Porcelain, 
Forming  the  Collection  of  Sir  Henry  Thompson:  drawings  finer  than 
any  of  similar  subjects  by  Japanese  artists  or  by  Jacquemart,  and 
decorative  in  the  placing  of  each  object  on  the  paper,  and  in  every 
touch  of  the  brush  with  which  they  were.  done.  Three  or  four 
drawings  were  made  on  the  wood  with  Mrs.  Whistler,  but  never 
engraved,  to  illustrate  Little  Johannes,  and  a  few  for  picture  shows. 
In  his  catalogues  and  books,  save  for  one  or  two  in  The  Baronet 
and  the  Butterfly,  his  only  illustrations  are  Butterflies,  and  the 
ornament  on  the  cover  is  again  the  Butterfly.  For  other  books 
issued  by  William  Heinemann,  his  publisher,  he  designed  covers — 
two  for  Miss  Elizabeth  Robins'  novels,  in  silver  with  black  note  on 
blue  or  grey,  and  one  for  Mr.  Charles  Whibley's  Book  of  Scoundrels. 
The  portfolios  to  contain  his  etchings  and  the  photograph  of  his 
paintings,  published  by  the  Fine  Art  Society  and  Goupil's,  are  in 
brown  boards  with  yellow  leather  backs,  like  The  Gentle  Art  of 
Making  Enemies  and  The  Baronet  and  the  Butterfly.  For  the 
Jubilee  Portfolio  given  to  Queen  Victoria  as  the  memorial  from  the 
British  Artists  on  the  occasion  of  the  1887  Jubilee,  he  drew  the 
nitial  letters,  head  and  tail  pieces  in  water  colour,  but  the  lettering 
was  not  his.  He  designed  monograms  for  friends,  usually  letters  in 
a  circle  or  oval.  One  of  the  best  was  for  the  International  Society 
of  Sculptors,  Painters  and  Gravers,  the  effect  obtained  by  the  long 
curves  of  the  S's  and  the  G's,  and  another  was  for  Mr.  Heinemann. 
But  of  the  beauty  and  expression  he  could  get  from  a  monogram, 
the  most  delightful  and  famous  example  is  the  Butterfly,  evolved 
from  the  simple  interlacing  of  the  letters  J.  M.  W. 
Everything  Whistler  designed  was  a  work  of  art,  and  nothing  in  his 
art  was  unimportant.  In  his  decorative  work,  as  in  everything  else, 
he  proved  that  genius  is  the  capacity  for  taking  pains,  and  he 
has  triumphed. 


306 


APPENDIX  II:  THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL 

Though  Whistler's  work  is  his  Memorial,  the  members  of  the  Coun 
cil  of  the  International  Society  of  Sculptors,  Painters  and  Gravers 
determined  to  erect  a  Memorial  as  durable  as  bronze  could  make  it 
which  would  testify  their  appreciation  of  their  first  President. 
They  realized  that  other  friends  of  the  man  and  admirers  of  his 
work  should  be  consulted  and  a  meeting  was  called  by  Mr.  Heine- 
mann — Whistler's  friend  ind  publisher.  It  was  attended  by  Mr. 
Lavery,  Professor  Sauter,  j.  and  Mr.  Stirling  Lee  as  Secretary  of  the 
International.  M.  Theodore  Duret,  Mr.  Freer,  and  Mr.  George 
VanderbiltJ — in  London  at  the  time — were  also  invited.  Mr. 
Vanderbilt  did  not  attend  and  Mr.  Freer  was  scarcely  favourable 
to  the  project.  But  instead  of  being  disconcerted,  the  council 
appointed  a  Committe  of  the  International,  consisting  of  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Society  present  at  the  meeting.  Mr.  William  Webb  was 
made  Honorary  Treasurer  and  Mr.  Stirling  Lee,  Honorary  Secre 
tary.  As  M.  Rodin  had  in  the  meanwhile  been  elected  President  of 
the  Society,  and  also  because  of  his  fame  as  a  sculptor,  it  was  de 
cided  that  he  should  be  invited  to  design  the  Memorial.  Mr. 
Harry  Wilson  and  J.  were  asked  to  go  to  Paris  and  see  M.  Rodin. 
This  they  did  after  a  scheme  for  the  Memorial  had  been  considered 
by  the  Committee.  The  idea  was  that  at  the  western  end  of  the 
Gardens  on  Chelsea  Embankment — the  little  park  looking  towards 
the  Chelsea  in  which  Whistler  had  lived  and  died — there  should 
be  placed  a  Winged  Victory  symbolizing  Whistler's  triumph — the 
triumph  of  Art  over  the  Enemies.  Rodin  agreed  with  the  suggestion, 
for  it  gave  him  a  splendid  opportunity  and  besides,  as  he  said, 
he  had  never  made  a  portrait  of  Whistler  and  would  not  think  of 
faking  one.  Rodin  offered  to  undertake  the  commission  without 
charge  save  for  the  casting  and  other  technical  work,  the  cost 
of  which  he  estimated  at  fifty  thousand  francs,  then  ten 
thousand  dollars.  The  Society  had  no  such  sum,  or  anything  like 
it,  and  a  public  subscription  was  opened.  The  names  of  several 
other  prominent  men  were  added  to  the  Committee,  including 
Lord  Plymouth,  Lord  Grimthorpe,  Mr.  George  Wyndham,  Mr. 
Harold  Hartley  and  Mr.  David  Croal  Thomson.  It  was  further 
decided  that  if  a  sufficient  sum  could  be  obtained,  replicas 
should  be  offered  to  the  City  of  Paris  and  to  the  United  States. 
The  London  County  Council  was  approached  and  they  agreed  to 
give  the  site.  This  was  arranged  by  Mr.  E.  J.  Horniman,  member 
for  Chelsea.  Then  Rodin  came  to  London,  went  with  members  of 
the  International  Society  and  the  London  County  Council  to 
inspect  the  site,  was  keen  about  the  project  which  developed  into 

307 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

the  larger  plan  of  cutting  off  the  end  of  the  Gardens  and,  in  this 
space,  placing  a  semi-circular — a  Roman  seat  like  the  seat  at  the 
base  of  St.  Gaudens'  Lincoln  in  Chicago  or  those  at  Pompeii 
and  in  the  centre  above  it  should  stand  the  Winged  Victory.  Rodin 
was  so  interested  that  he  said  he  would  go  to  work  at  once,  though 
there  were  as  yet  no  funds. 

Subscriptions  at  first  came  in  slowly,  but  from  all  sorts  and  con 
ditions  of  men  and  women.  At  the  end  of  two  years  a  certain, 
but  not  sufficient,  sum  had  been  raised.  Then  followed  the  Whistler 
Memorial  Exhibition,  the  most  successful  one-man  show  ever 
held  in  London — another  triumph  for  Whistler.  From  the  profits, 
the  International  voted  a  sum  of  five  hundred  pounds  as  their 
tribute  to  the  man  who  made  them  as  well  as  modern  international 
art  in  Great  Britain.  The  gift  was  announced  in  the  press,  and  the 
public  was  again  invited  to  subscribe.  And  it  did  subscribe,  al 
though  in  some  quarters  there  was  an  attempt  at  opposition,  it 
being  stated  that  Whistler  wished  no  memorial  of  himself  by  Rodin. 
Why  he  should  object  to  Rodin,  and  even  to  a  Memorial,  before  his 
death,  it  was  hard  to  understand,  though  it  is  true  he  once  said  to  J. 
he  wished  to  have  no  portrait,  like  Rossetti's  in  the  same  garden, 
"with  a  tap  in  his  tummy. "  Nor,  we  are  sure,  would  he  have  cared 
to  figure,  like  Carlyle,  dressed  in  an  ancient  toga  and  seated  in  a 
modern  armchair.  Curiously,  Sir  J.  E.  Boehm,  who  did  the  Carlyle 
was  the  only  sculptor  for  whom  Whistler  ever  posed. 
About  this  time  also,  the  Committee  was  re-constituted,  and 
William  Heinemann  and  Joseph  Pennell  became  joint  Honorary 
Secretaries.  They  worked  hard  and  before  long  the  required  sum 
was  raised  for  the  British  Memorial  and  the  American  replica  as 
well.  The  United  States,  that  had  mostly  spurned  Whistler  until 
his  fame  was  assured,  now  struggled,  not  only  for  his  works,  but 
to  get  the  Memorial  which  was  awarded  to  the  City  of  Lowell, 
Massachussetts.  Lowell  was  Whistler's  birthplace.  The  Lowell 
Art  Association  had  purchased  the  house  in  which  he  was  born. 
Lowell  seemed  therefore  the  most  appropriate  spot  in  his  own 
country.  Besides,  Lowell  first  asked  for  it,  and  raised  the 
money  to  pay  for  it.  An  American  Committee  was  appointed  with 
Mr.  Joseph  A.  Nesmith,  Mr.  Harrison  S.  Morris  and  Mr.  William 
M.  Chase  among  its  members,  and  the  sum  necessary  for  the  Amer 
ican  replica  was  quickly  subscribed  in  the  United  States.  On  the 
other  hand,  France  showed  little  enthusiasm.  The  list  of  sub 
scribers  in  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States  was  extraordinary 
including  almost  every  one  known  in  art  and  literature,  many 
subscriptions  coming  from  the  most  unexpected  quarters  and  rang- 
308 


RODIN'S  REJECTED  MEMORIAL  TO  WHISTLER 


ORIGINAL    MODEL    FOR    THE    MEMO 
RIAL  SHOWN  IN  PARIS  SALON 


FINAL  SKETCH  MODEL  OF  MEMORIAL 
REJECTED  BY  THE  COMMITTEE 


Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL 

ing  from  sixpence  to  hundreds  of  pounds.  Among  the  subscribers 
were  twenty  members  of  the  Royal  Academy,  a  larger  number  than 
would  have  been  necessary  to  elect  Whistler  and  Rodin  to  that 
body  from  which  they  were  carefully  excluded.  Henry  James, 
Thomas  Hardy,  Maurice  Hewlett,  Austin  Dobson,  Rudyard 
Kipling,  Bernard  Shaw,  H.  G.  Wells,  Edmund  Gosse  and  George 
Trevelyan  were  glad  to  honour  the  memory  of  a  man  for  whom 
they  had  done  little  during  his  lifetime.  Names  of  lords  and  persons 
of  title,  not  a  few,  were  in  the  first  list:  Sir  W.  Martin  Conway, 
Lady  St.  Helier,  Sir  Hugh  Bell,  Lord  Grimthorpe,  the  Rt.  Hon.  the 
Earl  of  Plymouth,  the  Viceroy  of  India,  Count  Plunkett,  Lord 
Redesdale,  Lady  Archibald  Campbell.  Dealers  there  were  who 
had  believed  in  him  and  his  work:  D.  Croal  Thomson,  Ernest 
G.  Brown,  Messrs.  D.  and  P.  Colnaghi,  Messers.  Dowdeswell, 
Robert  Dunthorne,  Messrs.  Obach,  Messrs.  Agnew.  Curiously,  the 
American  and  French  dealers  who  made  more  than  any  out  of  his 
work,  were  conspicuous  by  their  absence  from  this  first  list.  There 
were  Museum  Directors:  Sir  Charles  Holroyd  of  the  National 
Gallery,  Mr.  Lionel  Cust  of  the  National  Portrait  Gallery,  Mr. 
Whitworth  Wallis  of  the  Birmingham  Museum,  Mr.  Butler  Wood 
of  Cartwright  Hall,  Bradford,  the  only  four.  Now,  every  gallery 
clamours  for  the  work  of  these  two  artists.  At  that  time  it  was 
not  wanted.  There  was  one  art  critic— Mr.  M.  H.  Spielmann,  F.  S. 
A.,  who  just  before  Whistler's  death  had  done  what  he  could  to 
injure  him.  The  worm  sometimes  does  turn.  There  was  a  parson, 
a  professor,  two  ambassadors — Whitelaw  Reid  and  Sir  Rennell 
Rodd.  But,  it  was  from  artists  and  art  students  who  had  always 
believed  in  him,  including  Whistler's  and  Rodin's  own  Society, 
that  support  really  came:  the  American  Art  Association  in  Paris, 
pupils  of  the  Royal  College  of  Art,  the  London  County  Council 
Technical  Schools,  The  National  Academy  of  Design  alone  in 
America.  Many  of  the  Artists  subscribing  were  of  international 
fame  which,  great  then,  has  since  increased:  E.  A.  Abbey,  Paul 
Bartlett,  J.  E.  Blanche,  Timothy  Cole,  Storm  Van  s'Gravesande, 
James  Guthrie,  Alexander  Harrison,  Josef  Israels,  A.  Lepere,  John 
Lavery,  Gari  Melchers,  Frederick  MacMonnies,  William  Nichol 
son,  Arthur  Rackham,  J.  F.  RafTaelli,  Professor  Sauter,  John 
Sargent,  E.  J.  Sullivan,  Fritz  Thaulow,  E.  A.  Walton.  The  list 
it  truly  international.  There  were  even  collectors:  J.  J.  Cowan, 
J.  P.  Heseltine,  H.  J.  Theobald,  Pickford  Waller,  W.  H.  Jessop, 
Edmund  Davis,  Mrs.  Potter  Palmer,  Howard  Mansfield.  It  is 
interesting  to  note  that  the  names  of  Charles  L.  Freer,  George  H. 
Vanderbilt,  Richard  Canfield,  Henry  C.  Frick,  and  other  eminent 

309 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

American  collectors,  who  had  done  much  to  make  themselves 
known  through  Whistler,  did  not  appear,  nor  those  of  most  of  the 
British  and  foreign  collectors  who  had  been  extremely  anxious  to 
unload  their  Whistlers,  and  who  did  unload  them  at  a  phenomenal 
advance,  when  they  found  that  the  works  they  acquired  for 
nothing  had  become  too  valuable  to  keep. 

A  special  interest  was  shown  in  Chelsea,  Whistler's  home  in  London, 
a  special  Chelsea  Committee  was  formed,  a  special  meeting  was 
held,  and  almost  all  the  prominent  people  of  Chelsea  came  to  it  on 
July  9,  1907.  Lord  Plymouth  who  presided  said  he  looked  back 
"with  pride  on  the  years  Whistler  spent  in  this  country  and  the 
years  he  lived  in  Chelsea,  and  we  desire  not  to  be  behind  hand  in 
showing  future  generations  that  Mr.  Whistler's  art  was  appreciated 
and  that  we  do  not  forget  the  many  years  he  spent  in  Chelsea." 
Lord  Redesdale,  who  in  the  old  Lindsey  Row  days  lived  next  to 
Whistler,  spoke  and  also  Edmund  Gosse.  Lord  Redesdale  dwelt 
upon  Whistler's  love  of  Chelsea — "He  was  constant  to  Chelsea 
to  the  very  end."  Mr  Gosse's  speech  was  one  of  the  best  he  has 
ever  made.  No  one  could  better  have  explained  why  there  should 
be  a  Memorial  and  why  Chelsea  was  the  place  for  it. 
"Why  should  we  raise  a  monument  to  Whistler?  Largely,  I  think, 
because  he  added  a  sense  of  beauty  to  our  world.  Let  no  one  call 
that  a  little  matter.  Beauty  and  ugliness  are  not  indifferent  to  us, 
there  is  all  the  difference  between  them  that  lies  beween  health  and 
languor,  between  happiness  and  dulness.  Have  you  ever  reflected 
on  the  positive  biological  value  of  beauty?  It  is  stimulating,  tonic, 
beneficent;  it  adds,  directly,  to  the  wealth  and  fulness  of  our  physi 
cal  life.  But  beauty  does  not  exist  till  we  give  it  optical  recognition, 
and  that  has  to  come  to  us,  first  of  all,  from  an  interpreter.  It  has 
to  come  from  a  heaven-sent  interpreter,  with  a  temperament  like 
Whistler's,  fragile  and  enduring,  sensitive  and  not  sentimental, 
a  temperament  like  a  fine  steel  wire. 

"He  steeped  London  in  his  new-found  beauty,  and  it  is  for  us  to 
return  him  a  little  cupful  of  London  homage.  When  I  say  London, 
might  I  not  say  Chelsea  ? 

"There,  opposite  the  old  church  that  he  liked  to  attend,  close  to 
the  brown  and  shining  river,  will  be  set  up  the  memorial  to  James 
McNeill  Whistler,  who  loved  it  all  more  intelligently  than  any  man 
that  lived  before  him,  and  who  taught  us  to  love  it.  Perhaps  on 
blue  and  glassy  summer  nights,  such  as  we  may  almost  say  that  he 
created,  his  spirit  may  deign  to  descend  for  a  moment  and  hover 
round  it,  not  ill  content  with  the  ripening  verdict  of  taste  and  this 
slight  symbol  of  the  triumph  of  his  powerful  will. " 
310 


THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL 

Despite  the  enthusiasm  there  were  complications.  The  London 
County  Council  demanded  a  sketch  by  Rodin.  This  the  Committee 
refused  to  ask  Rodin  to  make  or  to  submit,  and  they  told  the 
County  Council  that  it  would  be  an  honour  to  London  to  have  the 
only  original  design  it  possessed  by  this  sculptor  erected  in  Chelsea. 
For  at  that  time  there  was  nothing  by  Rodin  in  London,  though 
shortly  after  a  replica  of  his  bust  of  Henley  was  put  in  the  crypt 
at  St.  Paul's.  Rodin's  only  other  connection  with  British  art, 
outside  the  International,  was  the  fact  that  he  had  been  rejected 
when  he  submitted  his  works  to  the  Royal  Academy. 
However,  the  money  for  the  Memorial  had  all  been  raised,  it  was 
invested  and  trustees  were  appointed  to  administer  the  fund.  The 
difficulty  now  was  with  the  sculptor.  Every  once  in  a  while,  public 
and  private  inquiries  were  made  as  to  what  had  become  of  the 
Memorial,  but  the  Committee,  recognizing  Rodin's  eminence, 
allowed  him  to  take  his  time.  Now  and  then  he  told  them  what 
was  going  on  but  it  usually  amounted  to  no  more  than  he  wrote  in 
a  letter  to  J.  towards  the  beginning  of  1906,  "The  Whistler  monu 
ment  is  not  yet  finished." 

He  was  always  delighted  with  the  success  of  the  project  and  when 
the  Lowell  Art  Association,  established  in  Whistler's  birthplace  at 
Lowell,  announced  that  they  would  raise  the  funds  for  a  replica  to 
be  erected  in  that  City,  he  sent  the  following  telegram  in  November 
1908,  addressing  it  to  "  Le  Gouvernement  de  Massachusetts  d  Lowell. " 
"Je  m'associe  a  cette  juste  et  belle  reparation  envers  un  des  plus 
grands  artistes  du  monde.  Uceuvre  de  Whistler  est  une  des  premieres 
et  integrales  manifestations  de  V art  Americain.  Je  suis  d'autant 
heureux  de  Vhonneur  qui  lui  est  rendu  que  fai  ete  un  de  ses  amis  et 
que  fai  ete  charge  du  Monument  qui  s'elevera  bientot  d  Lowell" 
An  amusing  wire  was  sent  a  little  later,  February  23rd,  1909: 
"Le  monument  Whistler  est  le  constant  souci  de  mes  journees  de 
maintenant,  d1  autant  que  ce  parfait  artiste  demande  une  sculp 
ture  reflechie  image  de  son  ceuvre.  Saluts  d  la  Phalange  de 
r Internationale  et  Homage  d  Lowell,  d  London.  Hurrah  pour  les 
bonnes  nouvelles" 

In  1908  the  Committee  asked  Rodin  for  a  photograph  as  they 
understood  that  he  proposed  to  show  his  design  in  that  year's  Salon. 
What  was  their  surprise  on  receiving  it,  and  on  visiting  the  Salon, 
to  find  the  triumphal  Victory  transformed  into  a  Venus  climbing 
the  mountain  of  fame,  though,  in  one  letter,  Rodin  described  it  as, 
a  Muse  who  would  hold — she  had  as  yet  no  arms — or  have  placed 
near  her,  a  medallion  portrait  of  Whistler.  She  eventually  held  a 
box  or  a  lantern,  and  below  it  a  relief  of  Whistler's  head  was  placed. 

3" 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Then  there  was  another  delay.  Either  before  or  after,  the  Seine, 
rising  in  Paris  and  penetrating  Rodin's  studio,  damaged  the  lower 
part  of  the  figure.  The  Committee,  however,  was  patient.  From 
time  to  time  J.  received  letters  assuring  him  of  the  progress  of  the 
Memorial.  This  one,  dated  yth  November,  1913,  is  characteristic: 
"MonckerPennell: 

Le  monument  Whistler  marche  vers  sa  fin.  Comme  sculpture  il  est 
bien.  Je  ne  sais  si  il  sera  bien  a  tout  point  de  vue. 
Patientez  encore ,  car  fhiver  jene  pense  y  travailler,  je  dois  m'absenter 
de  Paris  pour  ma  sante  qui  ne  supporte  plus  lefroid. 
Je  suis  honteuz  de  ne  pas  encore  etre  pret  etjefais  mes  excuses.  Rodin. " 
This  was  not  encouraging  especially  as  five  years  before,  June  7th 
1908,  Rodin  had  written  Lavery  that  he  needed  but  five  or  six 
months  more  to  complete  the  work.  On  the  I3th  of  April,  1916,  he 
wrote  J.  in  reply  to  queries  from  certain  subscribers  then  feeling  the 
pinch  of  war,  while  the  International  Society  had  almost  forgotten 
that  Whistler  was  their  first  President,  though  they  never  forgot 
their  five  hundred  pounds,  and  some  of  them  were  beginning  their 
endeavours  to  reclaim  the  sum.  Here  is  the  letter,  addressed  to  J. : 
"Moncher  Ami: 

Le  Monument  Whistler  etait  presque  fait  lorsque  la  guerre  est  Venue 
et  je  n'y  ai  plus  travaille.  Cest  la  premiere  chose  que  je  vaisfaire, 
sitot  que  je  serai  un  pen  libre.  Je  ne  peux  repondre  a  vos 
souscripteurs  en  ce  moment^  mais  six  mois  apres  la  guerre  terminee 
le  monument  pourra  se  mettre  d  Londres.  Ces  six  mois,  je  les  compte 
pour  lafonte  du  bronze  risque  d  rectifier  de  quelques  mois.  Aug.  Rodin." 
This  is  the  last  time  that  J.,  and  he  believes  the  Memorial  Com 
mittee,  heard  from  Rodin.  After  his  death,  even  shortly  before  it, 
his  artistic  affairs  passed  into  the  hands  of  M.  Leonce  Benedite, 
director  of  the  Luxembourg,  who  would  have  had  the  Society  accept 
a  marble  version  of  the  figure  substituted  by  Rodin  for  the  bronze 
Victory  he  had  consented  to  design.  The  Committee,  wishing  to 
know  the  exact  state  in  which  Rodin  had  left  the  figure,  sent  three 
artists,  Sir  W.  Orpen,  Augustus  John  and  Derwent  Wood,  to  see 
and  report  upon  it.  With  the  exception  of  one,  who  was  a  painter, 
they  agreed  that  it  was  "a  poor  thing,"  "quite  unworthy  of  Rodin 
and  the  master  it  was  supposed  to  perpetuate. "  The  Whistler  Memo 
rial  Committee  met  again,  considered  the  three  reports  sent  in, 
refused  to  accept  the  design,  which  was  but  a  fragment,  a  sketch, 
not  good  at  that,  and  moreover  not  the  design  originally  arranged 
for  with  Rodin.  This  was  the  second  grievous  disappointment 
suffered  by  Rodin's  admirers.  The  Balzac  was  the  first.  But  this 
is  the  first  time  the  story  has  been  told.  As  the  money  collected 
312 


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LETTER  FROM  RODIN  TO  JOSEPH  PENNELL 

Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress,  Washington 


THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL 

ten  years  before  was  given  solely  for  the  Rodin  Memorial,  it  was 
returned  to  the  subscribers  in  the  present  year.  The  whole  affair 
is  regrettable  from  every  point  of  view.  Though  Rodin  has  now 
several  replicas  of  his  work  in  Great  Britain  and  America,  no  im 
portant  original  was  made  for  either  of  these  countries.  Whistler 
and  Rodin  will  both  live.  A  Memorial  would  have  done  nothing  to 
increase  Whistler's  fame  but  it  would  have  added  to  Rodin's. 
Never  was  an  artist  given  freer  opportunity  to  produce  a  great 
work,  work,  which  he  himself  said  he  delighted  in.  Never  was  there 
such  a  miserable  fiasco.  Never  was  such  universal  support  given 
to  a  great  artistic  project.  This  can  be  seen  in  the  unnumerable 
letters  from  subscribers.  It  is  interesting  to  quote  from  them. 
Sargent  was  not  sympathetic: 

"I  must  confess  to  a  real  antipathy  to  the  idea  of  artists  erecting 
monuments  to  each  other  the  moment  they  die.  It  seems  to  me  to 
have  no  meaning  at  all  unless  it  comes  from  the  public  and  after  a 
lapse  of  years.  I  also  think  that  Whistler  would  have  hated  the 
idea.  He  never  was  funnier  or  more  sarcastic  than  on  the  subject 
of  the  monument  to  Rossetti  on  Cheyne  Walk.  I  subscribe  because 
the  work  will  be  by  Rodin. " 

The  lithographer  T.  R.  Way  was  of  Sargent's  opinion:  "I  cannot 
help  saying  that  the  purchase  of  another  picture  by  Whistler  would 
be  more  appropriate  to  my  mind."  But  later,  from  the  most  un 
looked-for  sources  came  sympathy  and  subscriptions  and  tributes. 
Walter  Crane  hoped  that  he  "might  be  mentioned  with  those  who 
desire  to  honour  the  memory  of  the  artist  whose  true  monument 
must,  after  all,  be  in  his  own  works,  though,  as  there  is  to  be  a  sculp 
tural  monument,  no  one  could  be  more  fitting  than  M.  Rodin  to 
carry  it  out."  Sir  Alfred  East  sent  a  subscription  as  President  of 
the  Royal  Society  of  British  Artists — the  Society  Whistler  had  made 
Royal.  But  it  was  almost  the  only  mark  of  appreciation.  The 
President  and  Council  allowed  a  subscription  list  to  lie  upon  the 
table  in  the  Suffolk  Street  Galleries,  but  feared  that,  as  few  mem 
bers  remembered  Whistler  as  President,  and  as  the  times  were 
"depressing,"  the  response  might  not  be  as  adequate  as  they  would 
like.  In  sending  his  contribution,  Mr.  Frederick  MacMonnies 
wrote:  "I  regret  that  St.  Gaudens  was  not  asked  to  undertake  the 
work,  as  I  do  not  care  for  Rodin's  portrait  statues  and  I  recollect 
that  Whistler  was  of  the  same  opinion. "  In  another  letter,  he  asked, 
"Why  could  it  not  be  arranged  that  Rodin  furnishes  allegory  for 
Paris  and  London  and  St.  Gaudens  model  a  portrait  statue  for  New 
York?  Certainly,  one  could  not  find  among  modern  personalities 
a  rarer  subject  for  a  portrait  statue."  Storm  Van  s'  Gravesande 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

regretted  that  his  contribution  was  so  little  in  proportion  to 
/' admiration  et  la  sympathie  que  je  ressens  pour  le  talent  du  grand  et 
tant  regrette  President  fondateur  de  ['International  Club.  That 
wonderful  mass  of  contradictions,  Howard  Pyle,  wrote,  "  I  am  not 
very  much  interested  in  Whistler.  If  it  were  a  question  of  a  Whist 
ler  Memorial  to  Rodin  instead  of  a  Rodin  Memorial  to  Whistler, 
I  think  it  would  touch  me  more  nearly."  He  alone  among  the 
artists — artists  of  the  world — sent  such  an  answer. 
Pyle,  however,  was  equalled  or  surpassed  by  laymen,  some  of 
whose  opinions  are  typical  of  the  attitude  of  the  greater  public  in 
regard  to  Whistler,  though  by  this  time  his  fame  was  assured. 
Clement  K.  Shorter,  an  editor  of  an  English  paper,  could  "not 
afford  a  subscription.  There  are  too  many  things  of  this  kind  going 
round.  But  I  shall  be  happy  to  make  a  note  of  the  affair.  If  I 
could  have  a  copy  of  the  design,  for  example,  we  would  reproduce 
it."  It  has  never  been  reproduced  before.  More  amusing  criti 
cisms  accompanied  some  of  the  refusals.  Francis  James,  after 
contributing  himself,  did  his  best  to  persuade  friends  to  be  as  gen 
erous.  But  in  Devon,  "in  this  barbarous  distance  from  any  art 
appreciation,  the  eyebrow  lifted  of  surprise  could  only  meet  any 
demand.  The  silly  rich  of  my  acquaintance  absolutely  refuse  my 
most  urgent  and  graceful  appeals  on  their  purses  for  the  Whistler 
fund.  The  following  is  a  specimen  of  the  answers  I  get:  *I  am 
sorry  to  disappoint  you  in  the  matter  of  contributing  to  a  monu 
ment  in  Whistler's  honour.  I  am  not  going  to  shy  anything  at 
you!  but  I  do  shy  at  Whistler.  Of  course  I  can  recognize  his  genius, 
but  the  few  times  I  met  him  he  invariably  set  my  bristles  up  by  his 
loud  and  preposterous  demeanor  and  manner  of  speech.  I  dare  say 
that  if  this  had  not  been  so  offensive,  I  might  have  been  amused  by 
his  unbounded  conceit,'  etc.,  etc.  Poor  Jimmy,  how  little  they 
understood  him!. ...  I  am  writing  to  my  friend  Mr.  George  Salting 
to  try  him — but  I  fear  these  great  collectors  are  worse  than  useless — 
they  like  paint  to  have  dimmed  some  hundreds  of  years  before  they 
honour  it  by  loosing  their  purse  strings.  I  smiled  the  other  day 
when  he  showed  me  a  recently  acquired  Corot  that  I  tried  in  vain 
to  get  him  to  buy  years  ago  at  one-third  the  price  he  now  paid, 
and  my  ardent  desire  to  lead  him  toward  Whistler  only  met  with 
blank  wonder." 

Another  artist,  who  lived  in  another  part  of  England,  declared  that 
"To  arouse  enthusiasm  for  Art  in  our  provinces  is,  I  know,  about  as 
hopeless  as  kicking  a  dead  horse."  Mr  Edmund  A.  New,  who  did 
subscribe,  felt  the  same  way  about  Oxford  where  he  hardly  "knew 
more  than  half  a  dozen  people  interested  enough  to  be  likely  to 

3H 


THE  WHISTLER  MEMORIAL 

wish  to  subscribe The  only  artist  I  know  is  so  thoroughly   a 

Ruskinian  that  I  hardly  think  it  is  any  use  asking  him.  (Of  course 
I  am  one  too!)"  But  more  surprising  was  the  answer  of  Fred 
Brown,  then  Slade  Professor,  whom  J.  had  asked  to  interest  his 
students  in  the  Memorial.  Mr.  Brown  wrote  that  "the  present 
generation  of  students  do  not  know  anything  in  an  intimate  sort  of 
way  of  Whistler's  work  and  genius. "  J.  suggested  to  him  that  their 
ignorance  or  indifference  could  easily  "be  remedied  by  the  profes 
sors  and  lecturers  devoting  some  slight  attention  to  this  not  alto 
gether  unimportant  matter."  He  also  found  the  same  state  of 
affairs  in  the  notions  of  the  Directors  of  the  Art  Students  League, 
New  York,  where  he  was  told  Whistler  was  not  the  fashion,  and 
fashion  now  bosses  American  Art. 

Amusing  protests  came  from  Chelsea.  One  man  was  "  too  much  out 
of  sympathy  with  Whistler  and  Rodin  to  join"  in  the  movement. 
A  second  could  not  say  that  he  "appreciated  the  work  of  the  late 
Mr.  Whistler  to  the  same  extent  as  many  of  his  admirers."  A 
third  was  shocked  at  the  price,  double  the  sum  needed  by  his  Vicar 
to  keep  the  Church  Schools  open:  "I  consider  that  the  re-building 
of  the  schools  is  a  much  more  important  matter  than  the  raising  of  a 
memorial  to  the  late  Mr.  Whistler  at  a  cost  of  two  thousand  pounds, 
which  appears  to  me  to  be  an  enormous  sum  for  the  purpose." 
A  writer  of  an  anonymous  letter  thought  it  an  outrage  to  have  been 
asked:  "Do  you  think  the  inhabitants  of  Chelsea  propose  to  con 
tribute  to  a  monument  to  this  scoundrel?  If  erected,  we  will 
destroy  it. "  Must  have  been  Mrs.  Pankhurst.  Judging  from  what 
the  British  vandals  did  to  Sargent's  portrait  of  Henry  James  in  the 
Royal  Academy,  they  very  likely  would.  Rodin  was  at  times  the 
objection.  An  old  friend  of  Whistler's  decided  "I  had  much  rather 
not.  Of  course  I  think  that  Whistler  should  have  public  recognition, 
but  I  look  upon  Rodin  with  very  incomplete  satisfaction."  Sculp 
ture  was  the  stumbling  block  to  citizens  who  had  not  known  him: 
"Whistler  was  a  Bohemian  of  genius  and  some  of  his  work  will 
probably  be  more  and  more  prized  as  time  goes  by,  but  I  recoil  from 
a  statue.  We  are  burdening  the  earth  with  too  many  statues  and 
even  Rodin's  co-operation  will  not  tempt  me  to  join  the  Com 
mittee."  And  there  was  a  P.  S. — "My  wife  is  of  the  same  opinion." 
Or  the  scheme  of  the  Memorial  seemed  too  ambitious  for  a  mere 
artist.  One  lord  protested  "I  am  really  not  in  sympathy  with  the 
effort  to  get  together  so  much  money.  An  artist  makes  his  own 
memorial,  and  something  much  more  modest  would  surely  be 
enough  to  record  Whistler  locally. "  Another  lord  was  still  more 

315 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

blunt:  "I  did  not  know  Whistler  when  he  lived  in  Tite  Street  and 
do  not  propose  to  take  any  part  in  the  Memorial. " 
Americans  in  London  were  not  over  responsive.  The  American 
Society  was  appealed  to.  The  Secretary  acknowledged  the  letter, 
said  it  would  be  placed  before  the  Comm  ttee  at  the  next  meeting, 
a  proceeding  which  yielded  the  same  splendidly  negative  result  as 
the  List  of  Subscribers  laid  upon  the  table  in  the  Galleries  of  the 
British  Artists.  Now  they  would  fall  over  themselves  to  get  in. 
The  Society  of  American  Women  never  answered  the  letter  sent 
them.  Of  what  Americans  in  America'  did,  we  have  already 
spoken.  Lowell  was  practical  and  generous,  and  Mr.  Nesmith, 
President  of  the  Lowell  Association,  was  justified  in  thinking 
and  writing  that  Lowell  had  done  its  part  The  United  States 
Government,  though  not  asked  directly  for  its  support,  indirectly 
interfered  with  what  might  have  been  one  large  and  help 
ful  subscription.  Messrs.  Carneigie  and  Rockefeller  refused. 
However,  despite  disappointments  and  drawbacks  and  refusals,  the 
project  prospered.  As  time  went  on  more  people  of  note  sub 
scribed.  Among  literary  men  now  were  George  Meredith,  William 
M.  Rossetti,  John  Galsworthy,  Theodore  Duret,  -Robert  Ross,  and 
among  actors,  Squire  Bancroft  and  Beerbohm  Tree.  Other  con 
tributors  were,  the  Lord  Provost  of  Glasgow,  Mrs.  Potter  Palmer, 
andT.  R.  Way. 

It  must  be  understood  that  the  failure  of  the  monument  was  en 
tirely  Rodin's  fault.  He  consented  to  carry  out  the  design  sug 
gested  by  the  Committee.  A  public  site  was  granted.  The  sum 
he  named  was  secured.  The  Society  waited  patiently  so  long  as  he 
lived.  After  he  died  the  endeavour  was  made  to  induce  the  Commit 
tee  to  accept  a  figure  that,  had  they  accepted  it,  would  have  been 
refused  by  the  London  County  Council.  It  was  rejected  not  by  a 
committee  of  laymen  but  by  a  committee  of  artists  sent  from  Lon 
don  to  Paris  to  see  it,  and  the  unfinished  Muse  still  stands  in  the 
Hotel  Biron.  The  whole  failure  was  due  to  Rodin's  failure  to  carry 
out  what  he  had  agreed  to  do,  but  had  left  undone  during  the 
fourteen  years  that  elapsed  between  Whistler's  death  and  his  own. 


APPENDIX  III:  THE  PAPERS  IN  THE  WHISTLER  v. 
RUSKIN  ACTION 

While  this  volume  was  being  prepared  for  the  printers,  we  were 
presented  with  a  series  of  valuable  documents  to  add  to  our  col 
lection  of  Whistleriana  in  the  Library  of  Congress.  At  the  re 
quest  of  Judge  E.  T.  Parry,  of  the  British  Bar,  son  of  Mr.  Serjeant 

316 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

Parry,  Whistler's  counsel  in  the  Whistler  v.  Ruskin  suit,  Messrs. 
Walker,  Martineau  and  Co.,  Ruskin's  solicitors,  sent  us  the 
Ruskin  papers  in  the  case  which  had  been  in  their  possession  since 
the  trial.  These  make  our  record  complete,  for,  already,  all  the 
papers  on  Whistler's  side  had  come  into  our  possession. 
The  Whistler  papers  include  not  only  the  Brief,  the  writs,  the  vari 
ous  other  legal  matter  for  which  clients  pay  so  dear,  but  forty 
letters  from  Whistler  to  his  solicitor,  Mr.  T.  Anderson  Rose.  Char 
acteristic  of  Whistler  as  these  letters  are,  the  Brief  is  the  most 
important  document  in  the  history  of  the  trial.  There  is  much  in 
it  that  never  came  out  in  Court  and,  supplemented  as  it  is  by  the 
Ruskin  papers,  there  is  now  not  a  stage  in  this  famous  law  suit  that 
cannot  be  followed — .1  record  for  all  time. 

Whistler's  Brief  is  dull  reading,  so  that  the  wonder  is  what  Whistler 
thought  of  it,  and  if  Serjeant  Parry  ever  read  it  through.  Certainly, 
he  made  no  use  of  its  strongest  arguments.  That  Anderson  Rose 
toiled  over  it  we  know,  for  we  have  also  his  first  draft,  full  of  cor 
rections  and  omissions,  whole  paragraphs  struck  out,  everywhere 
signs  of  the  labor  that  went  in  to  the  finished  document.  Probably 
he  worked  too  hard,  found  a  draw-back  in  the  mass  of  good  ma 
terial  and  the  many  good  suggestions  Whistler  probably  made. 
The  material  is  excellent,  but  legal  language  is  dry  and  the  language 
is  mainly  the  lawyers.  It  begins  with  a  concise  statement  of  who 
Whistler  was — "of  Irish  decent,  American  parentage,  Russian 
birth,  Parisian  education,  now  domiciled  in  England" — and  a 
short  account  of  the  work  he  had  done.  It  goes  on  to  explain  the 
libel;  the  exhibition  by  Whistler  of  pictures  in  the  first  Grosvenor 
Gallery  in  the  spring  of  1877,  and  the  criticism  of  them  by  Ruskin 
in  the  July  number  of  Fors  Clavigera  for  the  same  year.  The  libel 
lous  paragraph  is  quoted,  the  libel  contained  in  the  last  sentence: 

"I  have  seen  and  heard  much  of  cockney  impudence  before  now,  but  never  ex 
pected  to  hear  a  coxcomb  ask  two  hundred  guineas  for  flinging  a  pot  of  paint  in 
the  public's  face. " 

Then  the  tables  are  neatly  turned  on  Ruskin — the  idea  must  have 
been  Whistler's — by  showing  that  the  great  man7  who  is  so  sensi 
tive  to  what  he  consTderfi  thA  ovprrh-arge  for  work  by  others,  is 
guirty^ofjtne  same  enormity  himself.  Fors  Clavigera  consists  of 
only  twenty-four  very  widely  prin~^  pag*»e 


_ 

notes^nd  correspondence,  and  yet  this  he  sells  at  "the  exaggerated 
price  of  ^tenpence^  without  abatement  on  quantity.^  "TEwEm" 
described  its  contents  as  "letters  to  the  workmen  and  labourers  of 
Great  Britain,"  which  is  "a  gross  misrepresentation"  for,  says  the 

317 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Brief,  there  are  no  workmen  and  labourers  in  Great  Britain  who 
could  afford  to  pay  the  price.  The  number  containing  the  libel  is 
filled  with  "scandal  and  twaddle."  Ruskin  advertises  in  it  "the 
St.  George's  Company,"  an  enterprise  of  his  own,  in  which  he  is 
the  despot,  forbidding  the  use  of  steam  and  machinery,  determining 
what  books  members  shall  read  and  what  dress  women  shall  wear, 
even  imposing  a  religion  upon  the  tenants  of  his  Company's  estate. 
Libels  are  scattered  through  the  pages  and  "without  the  slightest 
apparent  connection,  he  drags  in  the  names  of  people  to  cover  them 
with  abuse  or  insult  or  filth";  now  dishonouring  the  memory  of 
Harriet  Martineau,  now  calling  Goldwin  Smith  a  goose,  mixing  him 
up  with  the  adulteration  of  butter,  flying  off  at  a  wild  tangent  to 
Isaiah  VII:  15,  flying  back  to  a  nice  girl  waitress  who  described  for 
him  the  adulteration  of  honey  with  carrots,  again  returning  to 
Goldwin  Smith,  the  goose,  and  from  him  wandering  to  Sir  Henry 
Cole  who  "has  corrupted  the  system  of  art  teaching  all  over  Eng 
land  into  a  state  of  abortion  and  falsehood  from  which  it  will  take 
twenty  years  to  recover."  This  is  "the  sort  of  publication  Fors 
Clavigera  is,"  and  the  sort  of  writer  Ruskin  is,  and  the  question 
may  be  at  once  asked  whether  his  attack  on  Mr.  Whistler  is  in  any 
sense  art  criticism,  or  is  it  not  a  gross  libel.  Then  the  answer: — 

"Mr.  Ruskin  says  that  Mr.  Whistler  is  'ill-educated  and  conceited',  and  a  'wilful 
imposter.'  He  is  a  'Cockney,  impudent  and  a  Coxcomb' who  'asks  200  Guineas 
for  flinging  a  pot  of  paint  in  the  public's  face.' 

"It  is  confidently  asserted  that  there  is  not  one  single  word  of  the  above  which  has 
a  reference  to  art  criticism.  It  may  be  said  that  part  of  it  is  vulgar  abuse  and  it  may 
possibly  be  admitted  that  to  call  a  man  a  '  Coxcomb, '  a  '  Cockney, ' '  ill-educated* 
and  'impudent,'  is  vulgar  abuse,  but,  take  all  these  epithets  together  and  con 
nect  them  with  the  charge  of  wilful  imposture  and  endeavouring  to  obtain  200 
Guineas  in  the  way  described  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  it  is  contended  is  a  libel  and  a  libel  of 
the  very  worst  type. 

"Those  who  know  Mr.  Whistler  intimately  would,  of  course,  feel  the  deepest  indig 
nation  of  contempt  and  perhaps  nothing  more,  not  against  Mr.  Whistler,  but  against 
Mr.  Ruskin  and,  but  for  Mr.  Ruskin's  age  and  known  infirmities,  a  man  if  he  has  no 
redress  at  law  might  be  tempted  to  avenge  himself  personally.  An  Artist  lives  in 
an  atmosphere  of  opinion,  he  finds  his  bread  slip  away  from  him,  his  position  as  an 
Artist  changes  speedily  from  competence  not  to  say  affluence  into  indigence  and 
poverty,  a  result  which  might  be  entirely  brought  about  by  the  malignant  abuse  of 
Mr.  Ruskin,  and  the  certain  following  which  Mr.  Ruskin's  known  powers  of 
vituperation,  as  well  as  criticism,  will  be  sure  to  have  from  the  envious  and  from  all 
the  cowardly  part  of  mankind. 

"Mr.  Ruskin's  opinions  are  accepted  as  Gospel  on  matters  of  art,  not  solely  by 
the  cowardly  and  the  envious,  but  by  many  patrons  of  art  and  purchasers  of 
pictures,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  his  expressed  opinion  in  Fors  Clavigera 
is  calculated  to  do  Mr.  Whistler  great  pecuniary  injury.  The  extent  of  Mr. 
Ruskin's  influence  is  already  shown  in  innumerable  references  to  the  article  in 

318 


COVER  OF  MR.  SERJEANT  PARRY'S  BRIEF  FOR  WHISTLER 
Pennell  Collection,  Library  of  Congress 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

the  newspapers,  by  'the  sort  of  newspaper  sheep  who  follow  the  critic  whom 
they  consider  the  ram  of  Art  Criticism.'  The  World  thinks  the  paragraph 
about  Mr.  Whistler  'pleasant  reading'  and  means  to  subscribe  to  Fors  Clavi- 
gera.  The  Academy  refrains  from  quoting,  but  suggests  that  a  single  number  of 
Fors  Clavigera  can  always  be  had  for  tenpence.  One  after  another  they  fell  in 
line  and  even  when  Mr.  Ruskin's  remarks  are  denounced  as  'things  to  regret,' 
as  in  The  Daily  News,  attention  is  still  called  to  Fors  Clavigera  and  so  brings  it 
into  demand.  'There  is  no  doubt  that  this  particular  number  was  more  no 
ticed  and  extracted  from  by  the  Press  than  any  other  number  had  ever  been, 
solely  because  it  contained  this  libel  on  Mr.  Whistler*  and,  as  a  consequence,  it 
reached  a  far  wider  audience  than  ever  before.  The  passage  referred  to  in  The 
DailyJ^pys  should  not  be  forgotten,  Whistler's  champions  at  the  time  being  so 
few.  Here  is  a  part  of  it  : 

"When  Ruskin  speaks  of  Artists  and  scholars  as  coxcombs  and  geese  and  tells  the          // 
world  what  animal,  or  what  critic,  he  would  like  to  be  at  the  hour  of  luncheon,  every-         u 
one,  as  a  rule,  feels  that  this  is  only  'pretty  Fanny's  way.'     But  to  mix  these 
flowers  of  speech  with  more  commercial  criticism  is  not  only  to  interfere  with  the 
laws  of  supply  and  demand  for  which  Mr.  Ruskin  cares  nothing,  but  to  infringe  on 
the  courtesies  of  literature.     These  laws  of  literary  courtesy  have  been  a  'late 

conquest  of  culture,'  to  use  an  affected  but  useful  piece  of  slang 

"Audacity  and  incompetence,  if  they  exist,  can  still  be  snubbled  and  made  to  find 
their  level  without  any  such  brave  words  as  Mr.  Ruskin  employs.  If  Salvator  Rosa 
had  lived,  even  in  extreme  old  age,  to  the  present  day  he  might  have  given  his  critic 
cause  to  remember  that  knives  have  edges,  and  that  men  may  sleep  and  may  have 
their  throats  about  them  at  the  same  time.  The  time  for  that  sort  of  repartee  has 
gone  by  and,  with  the  disappearance  of  artists  as  well  able  to  take  care  of  their  repu 
tation  as  Benvenuto  Cellini  was,  the  ever  plain  spoken  criticism  too,  might  be  al 
lowed  to  fall  silent. " 

We  wonder  if  American  lawyers  put  such  amusing  asides  in 
their  Briefs. 

Though  Anderson  Rose  had  not  the  talent  to  make  the  most  of 
all  this  material,  to  the  unlegal  mind  the  argument  running  through 
it  seems  unanswerable  and  too  valuable  to  be  passed  over.  But  not 
so  to  the  legal  mind.  Ruskin  was  treated  in  court  as  the  privileged 
being  he  believed  himself.  Ridicule  was  the;  weapon  reserved  by  the 
other  sideandfor  Whistler,whose  counsel  ignored  Ruskin,the  writer 
of  nonsense  and  malice,  to  defer  to  Ruskin  as  the  "gentleman," 
well  known  to  us  all,  with  perhaps  the  highest  reputation  in  Europe 
or  America  as  art  critic,  some  of  his  work  destined  to  immortality. 
Less  too  was  made  of  Ruskins's  unwarrantable  attack  upon  Whist 
ler's  prices,  without  which  there  would  have  been  no  case  for  libel, 
than  the  unfair  and  ungentlemenly  way  in  which  the  "gentleman',' 
had  spoken  of  the  plaintiff.  The  junior  counsel,  Mr.  Petheram, 
would  probably  have  brought  this  point  out  more  emphatically. 
His  opinion,  quoted  in  the  Brief,  dwelt  especially  upon  the  neces 
sity  of  having: 

319 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

"As  many  witnesses  as  possible  of  position  and  known  taste  in  readiness,  even  if  it 
should  not  be  possible  to  call  them  to  state  that  Whistler  holds  a  well-known  position 
and  that  his  works,  though  they  may  not  please  some  critics,  are  of  great  and 
recognized  merit.  Artists,  Picture  Dealers  and  Art  Critics  will  be  the  best  witnesses 
for  this  purpose." 

The  picture  dealers  could  have  been  wanted  for  no  other  reason 
than  to  testify  upon  this  question  of  price,  but  though  many  were 
chosen  none  were  called.  A  fact  the  Brief  discloses  is  that,  at  the 
eleventh  hour  the  difficulty  was  to  be  sure  of  any  witnesses  at  all, 
except  Albert  Moore  who  was  faithful  from  beginning  to  end. 
Whistler  tried  to  take  it  lightly,  though  it  was  no  light  matter.  He 
wrote  to  Anderson  Rose  on  the  subject  on  November  21,  1878, 
only  four  days  before  the  trial,  but  even  then  he  treated  it  as  of 
secondary  importance.  For  he  began  by  stating  again  his  view  of 
the  case  and  suggesting  another  important  note  for  Serjeant  Parry 
— that  he  is  known,  and  always  has  been  known,  for  his  independent 
position  in  art  and  for  the  Academy's  opposition  to  him — that  this 
would  account  for  any  evidence  Academicians  might  give  against 
him,  and  for  an  offer  Academicians  seem  to  have  made  to  paint 
one  of  his  pictures  in  five  minutes — that  his  art  was  something 
apart,  for  which  reason  he  did  not  need  a  large  number  of  witnesses.f 
And  then,  at  last,  he  gives  Anderson  Rose  good  names  that  occur 
to  him:  Holmes,  Librarian  at  Windsor  Castle;  Reid  of  the  British 
Museum  Print  Room;  Charles  Keene;  Tissot  and  what  of  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Haweis  who  had  preached  the  beauty  of  The  Peacock 
Room?  What  of  Prince  Teck  who  might  answer  for  it?  Though 
Boehm  and  Albert  Moore  ought  to  be  enough.  Tl^e  cause  of  this 
'  1  anxiety  was  the  withdrawal  at  the  last  moment  of  men  who  had 
!  agreed  to  go  into  the  witness  box.  We  had  always  heard~tliaT~~^ 
Leigh  Lull  Vfras  among  those  whu  pioiiiised,  and  we  never  knew  why 
he  failed  to  appear  until,  in  the  mass  of  the  Whistler  documents,  we 
came  upon  Anderson  Rose's  "  Costs. "  The  entry  is  for  November 
23d,  Saturday,  and  the  trial  was  set  for  the  following  Monday: 

"Attending  you  almost  the  whole  day,  conferring  on  evidence  and  it  appeared 
that  Mr.  Leighton  refused  to  attend  as  he  was  going  to  be  knighted  on  Monday. 
Mr.  Burton  also  refused.  .  .  ." 

That  was  the  last  engagement  Leighton  would  have  broken.  Albert 
Moore,  William  Michael  Rossetti,  and  W.  G.  Wills  gave  evidence 
for  Whistler.  But  if  one  of  the  artists  and  one  of  the  art  critics, 
whose  presence  the  junior  counsel  considered  essential  in  the  wit 
ness  box,  put  in  an  appearance,  not  one  art  dealer  was  heard  from. 
And  yet,  Mr.  Algernon  Graves  was  in  court,  waiting]  to  be  called. 
320 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

Mr.  Bernard  Oswald  Colnaghi's  evidence  had  been  prepared  in  a 

i|  Plaintiff's  Proof  given  with  the  others  in  the  Brief.  He  was  willing 
.  to  swear  that  Whistler's  Nocturne  in  Blue  and  Gold  was  a  most 
J  extraordinary  and  wonderful  picture;  that  the  libellous  passage  in 
*  Fors  Clavigera  was  not  fair  criticism  but  libellous  and  a  false  account 
of  Whistler  and  his  work;  that  Whistler  had  had  a  very  extensive 
education  in  art  both  in  England  and  France;  that  the  libel  was 
"calculated  to  do  Whistler  great  professional  damage,  stop  the 
sale  of  his  pictures  or  cause  them  to  be  sold  at  a  greatly  depreciated 
price."  This  was  evidence  a  jury  could  have  nnHprstnnH  from  _a_ 
man  whose  business  was  to  buy  and  sell  and  therefore  worthy  of 
their  respect.  But  Mr.  Colnaghi  was  not  called.  The  failure  to 
emphasize  this  question  of  price  may  be  one  reason  why  the  jury 
valued  the 'damages  at  the  iartning  Whistler  never  got,  so  otten 
described  as  hanging  on  the  watch  chain  he  never  wore. 
The  description  of  the  trial  we  do  not  give,  for  Whistler's  report  of 
it,  with  his  comments,  is  in  the  Gentle  Art  of  Making  Enemies,  and 
in  our  Life  of  Whistler.  But  the  legal  side  has  never  been  published 
before,  was  not  known  to  exist. 

The  Brief  for  Ruskin  is  shorter  and  less  dry  for,  incorporated  in  it, 
are  Ruskin's  and  Burne-Jones'  own  statements.  Ruskin,  in  his, 
worked  out  carefully  for  his  solicitors,  his  theories  of  art  upon  which 
the  libellous  criticism  was  based  and  the  solicitors  must  have  known 
they  could  not  improve  upon  it.  Ruskin  evidently  proposed  to 
publish  this.  With  some  additional  matter  in  the  opening  para 
graph,  references  to  the  farthing  damage  and  the  four  hundred 
pounds  the  law  suit  cost  his  friends,  and  under  the  title  My  Own 
Article  on  Whistler,  it  was  found  after  his  death  among  his  mss.  at 
Brantwood.  A  copy  of  it  he  had  sent  to  Charles  Eliot  Norton  on  the 
second  morning  of  the  trial.  But,  as  far  as  we  know,  it  was  never 
published  until  Sir.  E.  T.  Cook  included  it  as  an  Appendix  of  the 
second  volume  of  Fors  Clavigera  in  The  Library  Edition  of  the  Works 
of  John  Ruskin.  There,  the  chances  are,  it  remained  and  might 
have  continued  to  remain  unread,  interest  in  Fors  Clavigera  having 
been  exhausted  long  since  though  not  interest  in  the  trial,  had  not 
Judge  Parry  happened  to  see  the  Brief,  read  it  with  the  very  special 
interest  of  the  son  of  the  counsel  for  Whistler,  and  contributed  an 
article  on  it  to  The  Cornhill  for  January,  1921-.  In  this  he  spoke  of 
the  additional  interest  there  would  be  if  Whistler's  side  had  also 
been  preserved.  We  wrote  and  told  him  that  it  had  been,  that  the 
documents  were  in  our  possession.  It  was  then  he  succeeded  in 
obtaining  the  Ruskin  papers  for  us  that  they  might  be  preserved 
with  the  Whistler  papers  in  the  Library  of  Congress. 

21  321 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Ruskin's  memorandum  is  a  convincing  proof  that  he  had  really 
worked  out  his  defence  himself,  that  he  had  summed  up  what  he 
meant  to  say  when  he  wrote  to  Burne-Jones  that  the  trial  would 
be  "nuts  and  nectar"  to  him  because,  in  the  witness  box  through 
the  newspaper  reports,  he  could  get  his  views  before  the  public  as 
he  never  could  by  writing.  When  the  time  came,  however,  he  was 
not  well  enough  to  appear.  Both  sides  wanted  him.  He  wanted  to 
testify.  Whistler,  loving  an  open  fight  and  having  a  sense  of  hu 
mour,  wanted  so  much  to  hear  his  testimony  that  he  proposed 
Ruskin  should  be  subpoenaed.  There  were  several  postponements 
because  of  his  mental  and  physical  condition.  Though  Whistler's 
writ  was  issued  on  July  28,  1877,  the  case  did  not  come  into  court 
until  November  25,  1878,  and  even  then  his  doctor  would  not  let 
juskin  attend.  In  his  absence  this  statement  was  not  readx 
"he  main  contention  in  his  defense  is  that  the  paragraph  in  Fors 
Clavigera  was  no  libel  but  justified  by  facts.  He  pointed  out  that 
the  function  of  the  critic  was  to  recommend  Authors  and  hy  this 
he  rfTeant  also  Artists,  of  merit  to  public  attention  and  to  prevent 
Authors  ol  no  merit  from 'occupying  it.  "Allgooci  critics_dejigrit 
in  praising  as  all  bad  oneTm  blaming."  Hig"descnpFion  of  Whist- 
1'eT's  work  and  character  was  accurately,  arJsblutely,  truje^sofaras 
if  reached,  and  so  far  a?  it  was  accepted  was  calculated  toJge 
extremely  beneficial  to  Whistler  and  still  more  to  the  public. 

"I  have  spoken  of  the  plaintiff  as  ill-educated  and  conceited — because  the  very 
meaning  of  education  in  an  artist  is  that  he  should  know  his  true  position  with 
respect  to  his  fellow  workmen  and  ask  from  the  public  only  a  just  price  for  his 
work.  Had  the  plaintiff  known  either  what  good  artists  gave  habitually  of  labour 
to  their  pictures  or  received  contentedly  of  pay  for  them,  the  price  he  set  on  his 
own  productions  would  not  have  been  coxcombry,  but  dishonesty.  I  have  given 
him  the  full  credit  of  his  candid  conceit  and  supposed  him  to  imagine  his  pictures 
to  be  really  worth  what  he  asked  for  them.  And  I  did  this  with  the  more  con 
fidence  because  the  titles  he  gave  them  showed  a  parallel  want  of  education." 

That  the  price  an  artist  asks  for  his  work' .is  nobody's  affair  but  his 
own  and  the  purchaser's,  would  never  have  been  questioned  by  any 
critic  less  pontifical  and  autocratic  than  Ruskin.  But  it  should 
be  pointed  out  that  Whistler  had  been  getting  the  prices  which  were 
so  exasperating  to  Ruskin,  that,  curiously,  the  picture  Ruskin 
criticized  was  the  only  one  for  sale,  and  that  Burne-Jones  was  at 
this  very  period  asking  far  higher  prices.  But  how  the  situtation 
[has  changed! 

Ruskin  continues  his  memorandum  by  explaining  that  his  standard 
for  trie  estimate  ofjthe  relative  value  of  pictures  dependedon ~the 
justice  and_clearness~of  the  ideasThev  contained,  a  fact  he  had 
322 


.  r.-^.-^Sp.  ?&£§*. 

•  "    c£s**T3v  &4&» 

i        S^v^^-i'>-'^Vv- 


M     ' 

U'!    S*.  '<• 

^  :-^---- 


*  m « 

$L3.--mgi$r/]  ;.,«»::• 

A 


DAYS     WITH    CELEBRITIES.    (46). 


TRIAL.     CARICATURES  OF  TRIAL 

PEN-AND-INK 

By  M.  Bryan  in  "Judy" 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

e  specially  dwelt  upon  lately  for  the  benefit  of  the  modern  schools 
"whTcTTconceive  the  obiect  oi  Art  to  be  ornament,  rathpr  than  ^rjj- 
fi  cation.?  He  did  not  consider  it  unreasonable  in  a  critic  to  "re 
quire  of  a  young  painter  that  he  should  show  the  resource  of  his 
mind  no  less  than  the  dexterity  of  his  lingers,"  and  he  thought  the 
critic  might,  without  libellous  intentions,  "  remrnmendTKeTpecta-  . 
tor  to  value  order  in  ideas  above  arrangement.in_tints,  and  to  j  I 

tereos.1*/  f 


. 

rank  an  attentive  draughtsman's  wnrk  ahnvp  a  speedy  pla  stereos. 
He'can  be  agreed  with  when  he  condemns  patronage  of  incompetent 
artists  for  charity's  sake,  and  "the  corresponding  effort  of  large 
numbers  of  the  middle  classes,  under  existing  conditions  of  social 
pressure,  to  maintain  themselves  by  painting  and  literature  without 
possessing  the  smallest  natural  faculties  for  either.  ..."  That  advice 
might  be  taken  very  seriously  in  the  United  States  today.  Then 
he  loses  himself  again,  recalling  flourishing  periods,  whether  of 
trade  or  art,  when  the  dignity  of  operative  merchant  and  artist  was 
held  alike  to  consist  in  giving  each  in  their  several  functions  good 
value  for  money  and  a  fair  day's  work  for  a  fair  day's  wage.  And1 
he  finishes  by  announcing  his  intention,  whatever  might  be  the 
issue  of  the  action,  to  retire  from  public  life,  a  retirement  to  which 
he  was  before  sufficiently  inclined  by  the  langour  of  advancing  age. 
Afterwards  he  wrote,  in  still  plainer  language,  to  Dean  Liddell  that 
it  was  better  to  refer  his  resignation  of  the  Slade  Professorship  to 
its  real  cause  "which  is  virtually  represented  by  this  Whistler. 
trial.  "  All  the  same,  five  years  later  he  made  known  his  willingness 
to  accept  if  the  post  was  again  offered  him,  as  it  was,  and  he  ac 
cepted,  no  doubt  thinking  that  he  had  lived  down  the  trial  and 
its  consequences. 

In  this  memorandum,  we  have  the  real  views  upon  art  of  the  British 
public  of  the  time  through  the  mouth  of  its  prophet.  Ruskin's 
jusJjfication.JEa.s  more_outrageous  than  the  original  libeL^It  would 
not  be  surprising  for  his~criticism  to  be  considered  strong  speaking 
today,  the  courage  to  express  any  save  amiable  approval  amiably 
having  long  since  gone  out  of  fashion.  But  even  at  the  time,  when 
courage  in  criticism  was  more  common,  it  was  thought  that  Ruskin 
had  gone  too  far.  His  junior  counsel,  Mr.  Bowen,  said  so  bluntly  in 
his  Opinion.  Such  language  was,  in  his  words,  "exceedingly  tren 
chant  and  contemptuous.  .  .  .Mr.  Ruskin  must  not  be  surprised  if 
he  loses  the  verdict.  I  should  rather  expect  him  to  do  so."  The 
truth  is  Ruskinjvas  mad,  he  had  been  subject  to  intervajs_pf  rnacl 
riessf  for  some  years  past.  His  friends  would  have  been  kinder  had 
they  restrainecTTTirh  from  writing  "during  these  intervals,  and  Jie 
wiser  had  he?  m  his^Jucid  moments^jiestroved  "all  the  nonsense 

323 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

Ke  had  written. >  His  madness  is  theorly  excuse  for  hisconduct,from 
*his  first  attack  upon  Whistler  until  he  accepted  money  to  pay  his 
costs  from  sentimental  admirers^  for  Jus  acceptance  was  a  virtual 
admission  that  he  still  believed  the  libel  justified^ 
Jt  has  often  been  said  that  Whistler  suffered  little  from  the  neglect, 
misunderstanding  or  ill-will  of  his  comtemporaries — that  he  exag 
gerated  things.  But  no  one  can  doubt  the  ill-will  and  misunder 
standing  after  reading  Ruskin's  memorandum,  still  less  after 
reading  Burne-Jones'.  The  solicitors  state  in  their  Brief  that  they 
had  applied  to  several  Academicians  for  an  opinion  of  Whistler,  but 
had  been  refused,  a  refusal  they  attributed  less  to  Academic  appre 
ciation  of  Whistler's  work  than  to  Academic  disinclination  to  give 
evidence  against  a  fellow  artist  no  matter  how  bad  his  work  might 
be.  Burne-Jones,  however,  had  no  such  scruples.  He  not  only 
wrote  out  his  opinion,  but  wrote  it  with  a  venom  of  which  we 
would  not  have  suspected  him.  Ruskin,  it  is  true,  puffed  and 
boomed  him,  bought  his  work,  paid  his  travelling  expenses  and  his 
wife's  on  long  journeys  to  delightful  places,  but  gratitude  for  these 
favours  hardly  called  for  such  an  extremeof  rancouragainst  an  artist 
who  could  in  no  sense  be  a  rival.  It  seems  the  more  venomous 
because  the  memorandum  was  for  counsel  alone,  while,  when  he 
was  in  court  with  reporters  taking  down  his  testimony,  he  qualified 
his  criticism,  admitting  there  was  still  art  in  recent  Nocturnes, 
recognizing  Whistler's  power,  in  the  present  as  in  the  past,  to  sug 
gest  atmosphere  and  beauty  of  colour.  His  one  other  published 
opinion  of  Whistler  is  in  his  Life  by  Lady  Burne-Jones,  and  in  this 
he  refers  to  Whistler  an  as  artist  whose  technique  was  perfect  and 
colour  always  good.  He  naturally  could  not  foresee  that  his  con 
fidences  to  the  lawyers  would  ever  be  revealed  to  the  public  in 
print.  But  his  attitude  was  not  exceptional  among  Whistler's 
contemporaries  and  to  read  Burne-Jones'  memorandum,  together 
with  Ruskin's,  is  to  discover  in  Whistler's  defiance  during  the 
stormiest  years  of  his  life  less  of  the  mystery  that  has  been  made  of 
it.  And  it  might  be  a  good  thing  if  recent  American  authorities 
had  had  a  little  bit  of  knowledge  of  the  man  they  were  writing 
about,  or  the  brains  to  understand  what  they  read.  Or  is  it  the 
everlasting  anglomania? 

What  Burne-Jones  thought  was  this:  that  scarcely  anybody  re 
garded  Mr.  Whistler  as  a  serious  person;  that  for  years  past  he  had  so 
_ \£orked  the  art  of  brag  as  to  succeed  among  the  semi-artistic  public. 

"But  amongst  artist  his  varieties  and  eccentricities  have  been  a  matter  of  joke  of 
long  standing."  There  was  at  first  sufficient  excellence  in  his  work  to  make  artists 
look  forward  to  his  future,  but  the  qualities  he  possessed  appeared  to  be  soon 

324 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

exhausted  and  it  was  long  since  further  fulfillment  had  been  expected.  He  was 
notoriously  without  principle  or  sentiment  of  the  dignity  of  his  art.  "It  is  a  jest 
but  a  fact  that  he  has  been  ceaseless  in  all  company  for  years  past  in  depreciating 
the  work  of  all  artists,  living  or  dead,  and,  without  any  shame  at  all,  proclaim 
ing  himself  as  the  only  painter  who  has  lived" — "he  has  a  perfect  estimate  of  the 
value  of  this  trumpeting" — "he  has  never  yet  produced  anything  but  sketches 
more  or  less  clever,  often  stupid,  sometimes  sheerly  insolent — but  sketches  always 
— not  once  has  he  committed  himself  to  the  peril  of  completing  anything." 
"That  Whistler  should  be  an  incomplete  artist  concerns  himself  alone,  but  that 
for  years  past  he  should  have  been  proclaiming  this  incompleteness  to  be  the  only 
thing  worth  attaining  concerns  art  itself  and  all  artists,  and  Ruskin's  forty  years 
of  striving  to  raise  his  country's  skill  would  have  ended  tamely  if  he  could  have 
quietly  let  pass  Mr.  Whistler's  theory  and  practice."  Whistler's  plan  has  been 
to  found  a  school  of  incapacity — his  work  has  the  merit  that  one  sees  in  the  work 
of  a  clever  amateur — There  is  often  not  so  much  appearance  of  labour  in  one  of 
his  pictures  as  there  is  in  a  rough  sketch  by  another  artist  and  yet  he  asks  as 
much  for  one  of  those  as  most  artists  do  for  pictures  skillfully  and  conscientiously 
finished — Mr.  Ruskin's  language  is  justified  on  the  grounds  of  the  scandal  that 
this  violent  puffing  of  what  is  at  best  a  poor  performance  brings  upon  art.  "If 
any  one  caring,  as,  Mr.  Ruskin  does,  for  the  question  of  art  could  think  this 
meaningless  scribbling  should  be  looked  upon  as  real  art,  for  admiration  and 
reward,  I  think  he  might  lay  his  pen  down  and  never  write  again,  for  art  would 
be  at  an  end." 

That  Burne-Jones  could  have  been  guilty  of  such  a  misconception, 
such  a  misrepresentation  of  Whistler  could  hardly  be  believed  were 
it  not  there,  written  out  plainly,  in  the  Brief.  Whistler,  who  had 
done  nothing  to  fulfill  his  first  early  promise,  from  whom  further 
fulfillment  had  long  ceased  to  be  expected  who  had  never  produced 
anything  but  sketches,  had  then  painted  and  exhibited  the  Mother, 
the  Carlyle  and  the  Miss  Alexander,  The  White  Girl,  The  Little  White 
Girl,  and  the  elaborate  Japanese  Series,  to  say  nothing  of  the  Noc 
turnes  reviled  by  Ruskin — and  several  of  these  paintings  were  in 
the  Grosvenor  and  shown  at  the  trial.  We  knew  that  Burne-Jones 
was  not  in  sympathy  with  Whistler's  work,  but  we  had  not  fancied 
him  so  blinded  by  narrow  prejudice,  and  we  wondered  why  he  was 
so  upset  when  we  told  him  how  his  work  interested  Whistler.  Nor 
does  it  seem  possible  that  the  perversion  of  the  "Why  drag  in 
Velasquez"  story  could  have  been  anything  save  intentional. 
That  Whistler  held  himself  to  be  the  only  painter  who  ever  lived, 
and  said  so,  is  farcical  to  those  who  knew  his  reverence  for  the 
Old  Masters  and  generous  appreciation  of  contemporaries  whose 
work  he  thought  good.  HoJsss  unpardonable  is  the  representation 
of  Whistler  as  notoriously  without  principle  or  sentiment  for  the 
dignity  of  his  art.  It  was  his  care  for  the  dignity  ot  art  that  haH 
made  him  forc(T  RuskinTnto  the  law  courts.  JNor  could  Kiisinn's 
solicitors  have  doubted  it  after  one  experience  with  him  during  the 

325 


THE  WHISTLER  JOURNAL 

preparations  for  the  trial.  They  had  demanded  to  see  the  pictures 
he  had  shown  at  the  Grosvenor.  Whisth  r  objected.  He  was  not 
going  to  allow  anybody  to  discuss  and  cri  ~ize  his  pictures — were 
the  persons  who  asked  proper  experts?  [.\\  ,  not  the  whole  thing  a 
question  of  Pure  Law,  not  of  Criticism:  The  Court,  however, 
gave  the  solicitors  for  the  defence  an  Order  or  Inspection,  and  then 
they  demanded  to  have  the  pictures  brought  to  Anderson  Rose's 
office.  Whistler  was  outraged.  He  might  ha  ^e  to  obey  the  ruling 
of  the  law,  but  his  pictures  were  not  to  be  shown  in  any  accidental 
or  promiscuous  manner — pictures  were  no ;  to  be  handled  about 
like  samples  of  butter  to  be  inspected  by  chan<  *  experts  in  the  mar 
ket  place,  and  his  were  to  be  shown  properly  hung  as  they  were 
when  first  seen  by  Mr.  Ruskin,  his  studio  was  the  fit  place  with 
proper  light;  to  his  studio  Messrs.  Walker,  Martineau  could  come 
— and  to  his  studio,  accordingly,  they  went,  which  must  have 
given  them  a  better  idea  of  an  artist's  respect  for  the  dignity  of  his 
art  than  Ruskin's  preaching  and  Burne-Jones'  malice.  The  same 
spirit  of  malice  seems  to  have  inspired  the  selection  for  details — 
"circumstances" —  useful  for  counsel  in  cross-examination.  The 
story  of  Whistler's  quarrel  with  Haden  eleven  years  before  in  Paris 
was  dug  up,  together  with  his  expulsion  from  the  Burlington 
Fine  Arts  Club  which  was  the  result,  though  nothing  is  said  of  the 
fact  that  Dante  Gabriel  and  William  Michael  Rossetti  were  so 
indignant  that  they  immediately  resigned  in  protest.  The  descrip 
tion  of  the  materialized  spirits  or  figures  in  a  London  fog  he  painted 
as  portraits  was  resurrected  from  the  Times,  probably  Tom  Taylor's 
— and  TomTaylor  and  Frith  were  the  only  two  other  witnesses  that 
Ruskin  could  get,  though  he  had  hoped  for  Leslie,  Richmond  and 
Marks.  The  decoration  of  The  Peacock  Room  is  wilfully  con 
fused  with  The  Gold  Scab — "he  painted  the  walls  with  what  he 
called  Devil  Peacocks,  being  things  with  Devils'  heads  and  Pea 
cocks'  bodies,  and  on  the  tails  he  painted  sovereigns  intended,  as 
he  stated,  to  represent  Mr.  Leyland's  wealth" — and  of  course, all 
that  can  be  is  made  of  the  differences  with  Leyland  over  the  ques- 
•  jtion  of  payment.  Altogether,  the  Ruskin  Brief  is  an^  amazing 
[[document  and  does  Ynot  present  the  Whistler  v.  Ruskin  case^aTjT 
Ucreditable  incident  in  Kus  kin's  career..  The  fact  that  Whistler 
*was  an  American  may  have  had  something  to  do  with  the  personal 
feeling  shown.  No  American  artist  has  gone  to  England  who  has  not 
had  to  fight,  who  has  not  had  a  hard  time  of  it.  Even  though  West 
became  President  of  the  Royal  Academy,  it  was  by  no  means  always 
easy  for  him,  and  members  have  often  wished  the  others  who  have 
followed  him  into  the  Academy  out  of  the  way  and  their  places 
326 


THE  PAPERS  IN  WHISTLER  v.  RUSKIN  ACTION 

filled  by  natives.  Among  the  papers  are  copies  of  Punch,  with  comic 
reports  of  the  trial,  and^it's  sneers  at  "the  Anglo-American  Artist'' 
prove  what  we  have  sai-  •  completely. 

The  Whistler-Ruskin:  :>cuments,  though  legal,  still  live  with  the 
passions  and  turmoil  c  '.the  days  long  dead  when  the  virtue  of  art 
was  in  the  subject  anc  itsValue  measured  bv  the  time  and  labour 
spent  upon  it.  .Pictures  were  for  edification,  for  conscientious  toil 
the  artist  was  ffiv£n  his  reward.  Art  was  lost  in  the  maze  of  moral- 
itv.  genius  could  not  contend  with  industry.  When  Whistler  fought 
the  false  gods  of  his^gt/neration,  it  was  thought  he  was  fighting  for 
the  fun  of  it.  How  trong  the  enemy  was,  and  what  a  good  fight  he 
made  is  recorded  indiese  documents  which  it  has  been  our  privilege 
to  place  safely  in  the  Library  of  Congress.  Even  at  the  time,  un 
friendly  to  him  as  was  the  outlook,  Whistler,  with  his  knowledge 
of  a  lifetime,  won  the  case — though  not  without  the  farthing  sneer 
for  the  victory — and  the  result  was  not  "nuts  and  nectar"  but  gall 
and  vinegar  for  J.  R.  Oxon.  And  now  Ruskin  has  more  fame  as  an 
artist  than  as  an  author  and  Burne-Jones  is  near  forgotten,  and 
Whistler  has  triumphed  all  over  the  world. 


327 


INDEX 

ABBEY,  Edwin,  A.,  213, 295,  297,  309. 

Abbey,  Mrs.  Edwin  A.,   13,296. 

Abbott,  Mrs.  (See.  Jo.) 

Abram,  Mr.,  72,147,168. 

Academic  Carmen,  15,  32,  33,  35,  58,  71 

244,  254,  256. 

Addams,  Clifford,  34,  37,  246  256,272. 
Addams,  Mrs.  C.,  26,  27,  33,  35,  37,  254, 

257,  266,  272. 
Adler,  Elmer,  127, 129. 
Agnew,  Messrs.,  309. 
Alexander,  John  W.,  164,  228. 
Alexander,  Dr.  L.  C.,  158. 
Alexander,  Miss  May,  134. 
Alexander,  W.  C.,  109,  129,  134. 
Allingham,  H.,  175. 
Alma-Tadema,  Sir  Laurence,    122,   169, 

191,  197,  198,  230,  236,  241,  296. 
Altman,  W.  R.,  99. 
American  Hall  of  Fame,  221. 
Americaine,  V,  163. 
Andrews,  Mr.,  2. 
Andalouse  L't  199 
Andromeda,  171 
Ape's  and  Spy's  cartoons,  6. 
Archer,  William,  295. 
Architectural  Review,  The,  71,  72,147. 
Armand-Dayot,  Inspecteur  GSneralf  des 

Beaux-Arts,  16. 
Armstrong,  M.,  29. 
Armstrong,  Sir  Walter,  38,39. 
Art  and  Art  Critics,  78,  305. 
Arts  and  Crafts  Exhibition  Society,  34. 
Arts  Club,  3,202. 
Art  Journal's  Paris  Exhibition   Number, 

The,  191. 

Art  Journal,  The,  192. 
Art  Nouveau,  L',  73. 
Art  Worker's  Guild,  78,  81,  148,  251, 

293- 
Ashbee,  C.R.,  237,  238,  241,  246,  247,  250, 

257- 

Astor,  W.  W.,  30. 
Astruc,  editor  of  L1  Artiste ,  9 1 . 
Atalanta  in  Calydon,  28. 
Athenaeum  Club,  10, 139,  259. 
Aubert,  M.,9i. 
Augustine,  194,  202,  206,  208,  211,  212, 

220,  223,225,231,235,236,296. 
Avery,  S.  P.,  2. 
Axenfeld,  M.,  91. 


BACKER,  Otto  H.,  165. 

Bachimont,  Madame,  86. 

Baden-Powell,  Ma  jor-General,  16^ 

Balcony,  The,  137. 

Bal  Bullier,  92. 

BargelJo,  The,  47. 

Barrie,  Sir  J.  M.,  9, 179. 

Barthe,  117. 

Bartlett,  Paul,  309. 

Bartlett,  Mrs.  Paul  W.,  156. 

Barye,C.,  55. 

Baronet  and  the  Butterfly,    The,   19    20 

306. 

BatJters,  Courbet's,  162. 
Battersea,  Lord,  109. 
Batter  sea  Bridge,  120,  130,  137. 
Bate,  Miss  Inez,  (See  Mrs.  C.  Adams). 
Bayliss,  Sir  Wyke,  213,  250,  268. 
Beardsley,  A.,  12. 

The  Wagnerites,  12 
Beam,  Comtesse  de,  1 1 1. 
Beaumont,  Sir  George,   182,  184. 
Beaumont,  Lady,  182,  184. 
Beaux,  Cecilia,  39. 
Becquet,  90, 91. 
Beef  steak  Club,  183. 
Beerbohm,  Max,  16. 
Beerbohm-Tree,  Sir  H.,  197. 
Bell,  Edward,  261,  280,  281. 
Bell,  Mrs.  Arthur,  258-260,  280,  281. 
Bell,  Sir  Hugh,  309. 
Belleroche,  Albert,  16. 
Belloc,  Mr.  Hilaire,  76. 
Belloc,  Mrs.  Hilaire,  76. 
Be"ne"dite,  Ldonce,  83,  84,  205,  206,  230, 

242,312. 

Benham,  Captain,  181, 182. 
Benjamin-Constant,  49. 
Berenson,  B.,  47. 
Bernhardt,  Sarah,  91. 
Beurdeley,  M.,  n. 
Biarritz,  162. 
Bibi,  Lalouette,  85. 
Bibi,  Valentin,  91,  93. 
Billingsgate,  186. 
Sismarck,  Count,  57,261. 

§!a!kle'^nlter  B>'  I73'  I76'  J78»  '96. 
Blake,    William,  251. 

Life  of,  71 

Blanche, M.Jacques.,  14,84, 151,  309. 
Blenheim,  10. 
Blue  Girl,  The,  134 

329 


INDEX 


Blue  Wave,  The,  10,  162. 

Boat    Race  Day,    Hammersmith    Bridge, 

Greaves',  143. 

Bodington  and  Alexander,  243. 
Boehm,  Sir  E.  I.,  185,  308. 

Statue  in  the  Chelsea  Embankment, 

Gardens,  178. 
BoldiniJ.,  17,18,39,263. 
Bone,  Muirhead,  56. 
Bonheur,  Rosa,  37. 
Borie,  Mrs.  Adolphe,  212. 
Boston  Library,  34,  142, 
Botticelli's,  Spring,  299'} 
Boughton,  George,  196,  213. 
Bowdoin,  W.  G.,  220. 
Brinton,  Dr.  Christian,  140,  145. 
British  Museum,  66, 74. 
Brock,  Mr.  Glutton.  142, 145. 
Bronson,  Mr.  &  Mrs.,  165. 
Brooklyn  Museum,  134, 
Brown  and  Gold,  199. 
Brown,  Ernest  G.,  2,65-67, 133,  171-172, 

173,180,  184,186,188,227,  265,295,309. 
Brown,  Prof.  Fred,   202,  268,  3 14. 
Brown,  Ford  Madox,  170. 
Brown,  Oliver,  114. 
Bruckman,W.  L.,  233. 
Buller,  General,  54, 154,  240. 
Burlington  Magazine,  The,  296 
Burne-Jones,  Sir  E.,  27,  62,  63,  205,  300, 

322-327. 

Burns,  Robert,  177. 
Burrell,Mr.,  184. 
Butt,  Major,  226. 

CAMPBELL,  Lady  Archibald,  166,  309. 
Campbell,  Lady  Colin,  55, 166. 
Canfield,  Richard  A.,  209,  235,  242,  243, 
270,  271,  273,  275,  281,  285,  286,  309. 

collection,  l8o. 
Canichon,  86. 
Caran  D'Ache,  38, 193. 
Carfax  Gallery,  183. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  104,  116,  118,  119,  174, 
175,301,325. 

Portrait  of,  10,29,  129,136,137,178, 

288. 

Carmen,  152, 172,  244,  257,  258. 
Carmen  (See  La  Napolitaine),  73. 
Carmen,  Atelier,  228. 
CarolusDuran,  71,  72. 
Cauldwell,  John  B.,  199,    201,   203-205. 
Cavour,  37,  134 
Caxton  Club,  145-149. 

330 


Cassatt,  Miss  Mary,  167. 

Cassatt,  Mrs.,  134. 

Cellini,  Benvenuto,  319. 

Centenary  Exhibition  of  Lithography,  20. 

Century,  The,  4,  57,  85,  293,  296. 

Chambers,  Miss  Alice,  59,  67,  68,  130, 

165, 166. 

Champ-de-Mars  Salon,  6, 155. 
Chase,  Wm.  M.,  8,  71,  112,  141,  195,  196, 

226,  239,  240,  308. 
Chefdeville,  Louis,  220. 
Chelsea  Arts  Club,  21,114,213. 
Chetwynd,  Sir  George,  193. 
Child,  Theodore,  109. 
Christie's,  66,  168,185. 
Claghorn,  James,  L.,  2. 
Clark,  Sir  Charles  Purdon,  4. 
Clark,  Irving,  31-33. 
Claude  Lorraine,  248. 
Claus,Emil,6. 
Cole,  Alan  S.,  108,  109,  112,  129,  139, 

144,157,251,254. 
Cole,  Mrs.  Alan  S.,  30, 103, 108, 133. 
Cole,  Sir  Henry,  202,  318. 

Portrait  of,  134. 

Cole, Timothy,  17,51,53,247,248,  309. 
Collins,  General  Arthur,  193. 
Colnaghi,  Messrs.  D.  and  P.,  309. 

Bernard  Oswald,  321. 
Colvin,  Sir  Sidney,  64. 
Company  of  the  Butterfly,  15. 
Connie  Gilchrist  Skipping — The  Gold  Girl, 

183,  260,  271. 

Conway,  Sir  W.  Martin,  309. 
Cook,   Sir  Theodore   Andrea,    177,    224, 

226,  321. 

Cooper,  Mr.  Colin  Campbell,  256. 
Cooper,  Mrs.  C.  C.,  256. 
Coppde,  Professor,  240. 
Corder,  Rosa,  59-61,  70,  301. 

Portrait  of,  1 26,  276,  278-280. 
Cormon,  L.,  35. 

Cottier  Galleries,  New  York,  139. 
Courbet,  G.,  79, 90, 92, 94, 162. 
Cowan,  J.  J.,82,  309. 
Cox,  Kenyon,  66, 67, 126. 
Craies,Mrs.,  160. 
Crane,  Walter,  25,  263,  3 13. 
Crawford  Marion,  221. 
Cremorne,  134. 
Cremorne  Gardens,  97,  117,140. 

Series,  48. 
Critic,  The,  295. 
Crockett,  S.  R.,  177, 179. 


INDEX 


Cundall,  Mr.,  201. 
Curtis,  Mrs.,  165,          191. 
Cust,  Harry,  9 
Cust,  Lionel,  309. 
Custer,  General,  57. 
Custer,  Mrs.,  54, 57. 

Daily  Chronicle,   The,  15,  170,  198,  200 

212,  217,  2l8,  222,  246,  283,  284,  295. 

Daily  Mail,  The,  138. 

Daily  News,  The,  319. 

Daily  Telegraph,  The,  30. 

Dannat,  W.  L.,  204,  205. 

Darrach,  Doctor,  2. 

Daubigny,C.  F.,  55. 

Daumier,H.,  55. 

Davenport  Brothers,  177. 

Davey,  Humphrey,  219. 

Davies,  Rev.  Mr.,  119. 

Davis,  Edmund,  79,  309. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  180. 

Degas,  H.  G.  E.,  227. 

Delacroix,  E.,  80. 

Delannoy,  Ernest,43, 44, 49- 

Del&tre,A.,  81,95. 

Dell,R.,  295. 

Denny,  Annie,  portrait  of,  171. 

Derby  Day,  Frith's,  78. 

Deschamps,  L.,  85,  106. 

Dewhurst,  Wynford,  263,  264,  296. 

De  Wet,  General,  146,262,263. 

Dickens,  Charles,  197,  270. 

Dixon,  Miss,  33. 

Dobbin,  James  C,  181. 

Dobson,  Austin,  227,  309. 

Don  B  alias  ar,  120. 

Donkin,  Sir  Bryan,  226. 

Donkin,  Lady,  68. 

Dore,  G.,  263. 

Douglas,  Langton,  50. 

Dowdeswell,  Messrs.,  112,  136,  140,  145 

188,309. 
Dowdeswell,  Walter,   125,  132,    135-137, 

233,249- 

Doyle,  Sir  Conan,  9. 
Draughn,  Marion,  244. 
Dreyfus  Case,  The,  76,  249. 
Drouet,  C.,  1 1, 49,  86-96, 129,  162,  245. 
Drouot,  Hotel,  244. 
Duke  of  Marlborough,  n. 
Dulac,  Mr.  and  Mrs.,  160. 
Dulwich  Gallery,  229. 
Du  Maurier,  G.,  266. 


Dunthorne,  R.,  148,  230,  272,  290,  291, 

293,  309- 

Durand-Ruel,  201. 

Duret,  Theodore,  11,  33,  55,  85,  90,  91, 
96,  in,  164,  165,  227,  248,  261, 
263,  265,  290,  292,  293,  295-297, 
307,  3i6. 

Portrait  of  Whistler,  134. 
Duveneck,  F.,  7. 

EAST,  Alfred,  Sir,  143,  313. 

Echoes  of  Whistler,  158. 

Eddy,  Arthur}.,  146,  240. 

Eden,  Sir  William,  20,  32,  202. 

Eden,  Lady,  228. 

Eden  Case,  21. 

Eden,  Sale,  34. 

Edwards,  Mrs.  Edwin,  85,  227. 

Effie  Deans,  163,  245,  247. 

Eldon,R.,  123. 

Elwell,  Mr.,  77, 167, 169, 173, 177, 179. 

Emiha  in  England,  25. 

Ernest  G.  Brown  and  Phillips,  Messrs., 

173- 

Etchers  and  Etching,  147. 
Etty's  studio,  219. 

FAGAN,  Mr.  Louis,  74,  77. 
Fagan,  Mrs.  Louis,  77. 
Falling  Rocket,  The,  4. 
Fantin-Latour,  83-86, 192. 
Fantin,  Madame,  84,  85. 
Farquhar,  Mrs.  (Miss  Peck),  155. 
Faustine,  26. 
Fernald,C.  B.,  31. 

Cat  and  the  Cherub,  The,  26. 
?erris,  Gerome  2. 
?erris,  Stephen,  J.,  2. 
Fine  Art  Society,  172, 186-188,  265,  268 

Venice  show  at,  182. 
?inetter  91. 

^ireworks  at  FauxhalL  5. 
?isher,  Mark,  213. 
fisher,  W.J.,  284,  292. 
?lagg,  James  Montgomery,  135. 
"loury,  H.,  264. 

flower,  Cyril  (see  Battersea,  Lord),  109. 
?orain,  I.L,  153. 
?ord,  I.  N.,  273. 
"ord,  Paul  Leicester,  193. 
"ord,  Sheridan,  214,  216,  219. 
[ors  Clavigera,  317-319,  321,  322. 
^ortnightly  Review,  The,  24, 267. 
Fraley,  Mr.  J.  C.,  245. 

331 


INDEX 


Fraley,  Mrs.  J.  C.,  245. 
Frankland,  Mrs.,  270. 
Franklin,  Maud,  (see  Maud). 
Freer,  Charles  L.,  46,  112,  113,  134,  146, 
156,     241,     242,     246,     258-260, 
292,  294,  297,  307,  309. 

Collection,  161. 

Gallery,  Washington,  244. 
French  Cathedrals,  The,  12. 
Freshfield,  Douglas,  70. 
French  Set,  The,  49, 104. 
Frith,  W.  L.,  77,78, 121, 169, 149. 
Frick,  H.C., 99, 113,271,310. 
Fumette,  86, 90. 
Fur  Jacket,  The,  4, 163, 184. 
Furnival,  Doctor,  F.  J.,  26. 
Furse,  Charles,  9. 

GABRIEL,  Dante,  326. 

Galsworthy,  John,  150,  316. 

Galsworthy,  Mr.  S.,  151. 

Garlant's  Hotel,  17. 

Garrick  Club,  24. 

Gassoway,  Francis,(See  Howard,  Francis) 

275-  . 

Gavarni,  87. 

Gazette  des  Beaux- Arts,  83. 
Gay,  Walter,  228. 
Gentle  Art  of  Making  Enemies,   The,  36, 

183,  212,  216,  219,  250,  265,  306. 
Gibson,  Charles  Dana,  135. 
Gilbert,  Alfred,  275. 
Gilchrist,  Mrs.  Alexander,  71. 
Gilchrist,  Herbert  H.,  71. 
Gilder,  Joseph,  276. 
Ginsberg,  Doctor,  158. 
Giotto,  299. 

Glasgow  University,  275. 
Gleyre's  studio,  90, 172. 
Globe,  The,  200,  203,  205,  206. 
Godwin,  Mrs.,  E.  W.,  later  Mrs.  J.  McN. 

Whistler,  119,  166,  167. 
Godwin,  E.  W.,  106,  157,  166,  252,  302, 

303- 

Godwin,  E.  19, 21, 217,  296 
Gold  Scab,The,  113,  326- 
Goncourts,  the  de,  82. 
Goodyear,  W.  H.  105. 
Gosse,  Edmund,  27,  192  , 230,  295,  309, 

310. 

Goulding,  Charles,  149. 
Goulding,  Frederick,  80,121, 122,  148, 149. 
Goupil  Gallery,  10,  81, 136, 143,  284. 
Grand,  Madame  Sarah,  190. 

332 


Grand  Palais  des  Beaux-Arts,  73. 

Graphic,  The,  199,  200-203,  205. 

Grasshopper,  The,  119. 

Gravesande,  Storm  Vans',  112,  309. 

Graves,  Messrs.  H.,  60,  266. 

Gray,  W.  E.,  50, 105. 

Greaves,  Miss  Alice,  136. 

Greaves,  Miss  Tinnie,  97,  118,  119,  13   I, 

138. 

Greaves,  Mrs.,  123. 
Greaves,   Walter   and   Harry,    98,    106, 

114-145,161-163,166,179. 
portraits,  3,141,  184. 
Greiffenhagen,  Maurice,  190, 191,  275. 
Greiffenhagen,  Mrs.  M.,  190, 191. 
Grimaldi,  74, 147. 
Grimthorpe,  Lord,  307,  309. 
Grolier  Catalogue,  147,  242. 
Grosvenor  Gallery,  215,  325,  326. 
Grover,  Oliver  D.,  164. 
Guthrie,  Sir  James,  14,  47,  150,  151,  263, 

275,  283,  297,  309. 

HAGUE,  The,  245, 247,  249,  259. 

Haden,  Arthur,  212. 

Haden,  Lady,  78,  129,253,254. 

Haden,  Sir  Seymour,  2,  15,  43,  45,  79,  80, 

82,  182,203,212,254. 
Halkett,G.  R.,  143, 198-200. 
Halliday,  Miss,  33. 
Hamilton,  J.  McLure,  82,   143,  156,  214, 

215,217-219,277,296. 
Hamilton,  Mrs.  J.  McLure,  143. 
Hammond,  Mr.  &  Mrs.,  212. 
Hardy,  Thomas,  309. 
Harmony  in  Blue -Gray,  Greaves',  144. 
Harmony  in  White  and  Gray,  by  Harry 

Greaves,  144. 

Harper  Brothers,  Messrs.,  158, 194. 
Harris,  Frank,  16. 
Harrison,  Alexander,  72,  309. 
Hartley,  Harold,  206,  281,  282,  307. 
Hatrick,  A.  S.,  28, 139,  295. 
Haweis,  Rev.  Mr.,  320 
Hawthorne,  Julian,  250. 
H.ecker,  Colonel,  82. 
Heffernan,     Joanna     (See    Mrs.    Abbott 

and  Jo). 

Heffernan,  Patrick,  161. 
Heinemann,William,  1,15,16,27,  32,  34,  38, 

4i,  45,  50,  53>  i°S»  n°»  133,   139,  H2, 
145,  147,  190,  197-199,  204,  209,  210, 

213,    2l6,    2l8,    220,  230,  237,  249,    259- 

261,  264-266,  294-296,  306, 307, 308. 


INDEX 


Heinemann,    Mrs.   William,    32,  38,  39, 
45,  204,  209, 210, 220,  265,  276, 296. 

Henley,  W.  E.,  15,  34, 177,  291, 292. 

Hensman,  Misses,  189, 198,  231. 

Herbert,  J.,  159. 

Herkomer,  Sir  Hubert  von,  8. 

Hervier,A.,55. 

Heseltine,  J.  P.,  309. 

Hewlett,  Maurice,  283,  309. 

Hewlett,  Mrs.  Maurice,  76. 

Hogarth,  227. 

Shrimp  Girl,  257. 

Hogarth  Club,  9, 106, 214. 

Holme,  Charles,  295. 

Holmes,  G.  A.,  6, 1 19. 

Holroyd,  Sir  Charles,  309. 

Hommage  d  Delacroix,  80. 

Home,  Herbert,  45, 46. 

Horniman,  E.  J.,  307. 

Hotel  du  Bon  Lafontaine,  1 1. 

Howard,    Francis     (Francis    Gassoway, 
Francis  O'Connor,  275). 

Howard,  George  [Lord  Carlisle],  59. 

Howell,    Charles    Augustus,    58-70,  107, 
117, 121,  130, 133, 134, 164, 169, 170. 

Hubbard,  Elbert,  274. 

Hubbell,  Captain,  113. 

Huish,  Marcus  B.,  188. 

Hullah,  Miss,  160. 

Hunt,  W.  Holman,  26, 46, 169. 

Hunter,  Captain  Charles  H.,  74-77. 

Hunter,  Mrs.  Charles  H.,  74-77 

Hunter,  Mrs.  Charles,  236. 

Huth,  Mrs.  Louis,  102. 

Hutton,  Mrs.,  119,  122. 

Idyl,  An,  8. 

International  Art  Notes,  203. 
International  Society  of  Sculptors,  Paint 
ers  and  Gravers,  14,  145,  151,  305, 
306,  307. 

Dinner  held  in  Cafe  Royal,  283. 
Exhibitions,  2,  118,  137,  140,  145, 
162.     (See  Memorial  Exhibition.) 
International  Exposition  in  Paris,   (See 

Paris.) 

In  the  Studio.  161,  300. 
lonides,  Luke,  27, 83, 112, 132,  277. 

Constantine,  27. 
Irish  National  Gallery,  39. 
Irlandaises  Les,  Courbet's  162. 
Irving,  Sir  Henry,  141. 
Etching  of,  271. 
Portrait  of,  184. 


Israels,  Josef,  309. 
Ives,  Halsey  C.,  277. 

ACKSON,  Ernest  G.,  178. 

acomb-Hood,  G.  P.,  113. 

ameson,  Frederick,  6. 

ames,  Francis,  314. 

ames,  G.  P.  R.,  140. 

ames,  Henry,  309,  315. 

anvier,  Thomas  A.,  50,  51,  200,  220. 

anvier,  Mrs.  Thomas  A.,  50, 51, 200,  220. 

ekyll,  102,  no. 

enner,  Mr.  &  Mrs.,  68. 

erome,  District  Attorney,  in  New  York, 

280. 

Jessop,  W.  H.,  309. 
Jessop  Collection,  189. 
Jo    (Joanna  Heffernan,    Mrs.  Abbott), 

69,  118,  161-163,  254. 
Johnson,  Robert  Underwood,  18,99, 135. 
Jones,  Mrs.  Cadwalader,  155. 
Jones,  Gussie,  161. 
Jopling-Rowe,  Mrs.,  167. 
Journal,  Le,  193. 

KAUFFMANN,  Angelica,  93. 

Keene,  Charles,  320. 

Kendall,  M.,i6o. 

Kennedy  &  Co.,  Messrs.,  17. 

Kennedy,  E.  G.,  2,  17,  31,  39,  41,  50,  51, 

58, 73,  74, 77, 96, 97,  H7,  209-212, 242, 

271,273,290,291,293,294. 
Keppel,  David,  148. 
Keppel,  Frederick,  2,  80,   81,   85,  86,  90, 

96, 145-H7, 149. 

Keppel,  Messrs.  Frederick  &  Co.,  148. 
Kerr-Lawson,   J.,    45,  46,    47,  140,  178, 

296. 

Kerr-Lawson,  Mrs.  J.,  293. 
Kerr,  Dr.  Norman,  226. 
Kerr,  Lord  Ralph,  219. 
Kinsella,  Miss,  297. 
Kipling,  Rudyard,  309. 
Knoedler,  Messrs.,  161,286. 
Konody,  P.  G.,  138, 145. 
Kruger,  President,  204. 
Kruger,  Mrs.,  54. 
Kyllman,  O.,  22. 

LABOUCHERE,  Henry,  181-183. 

Lady  Elcho,  Mrs.  Adeane  and  Mrs.Ten- 

nant,  Sargent's,  39. 
Lady  Meux,  10. 

333 


INDEX 


Lady  Standing  at  a   Spinet,  Ochtervelt's, 

225. 

LaFargeJohn,  155, 156. 
Lalouette,  86, 93. 
Lambert,  John,  71,  72,  87. 
Landor,  A.  H.,  Savage,  209-211. 
Landseer,  Sir  Edwin,  172. 
Lane,  Sir  Hugh,  70, 138. 
Lane,  Mrs.  John,  28. 
Lange  Leizen,  135.  300. 
Lannion,  56. 

Lanteri,  Prof.  E.,  83,  235,  275. 
Laurenco  Marquez,  180. 
Laus  Feneris,  28. 
Lavenue's,  221. 
Lavery,  Sir  John,  14,  21,  46,  47,  73,  84, 

150,  152,  179,  194,  195,  200,  201,  217, 

218,  258,  263,  270,  273-275,  283,  286, 

288,  292,  294,  295,  297,  307,  309,  312. 
Le  Brun,  Madame  Vigee,  37. 
Lee,  Gerald  ,62. 
Lee,  Mrs.  Gerald,  62. 
Lee,  Mr.  Stirling,  307. 
Legros,  A.,  79,  80,  84, 89,  161. 
Leicester  Galleries,  65. 
Leighton,  Sir  Frederick,  122,  320. 
Leland,  Charles  Godfrey,  3. 
Lepere,  A.,  309. 
LeSidaner,H.,  284. 
Leslie,  G.  D.,  213,  326. 
Lewis  and  Allenby,  197. 
Lewis,  Sir  George,  34,  216. 
Leyland,  Florence,  105. 
Leyland,  Frederick  R.,  54,  67,98-113,122, 

133,134,302,326. 
Leyland,  Mrs.  Frederick  R.,  54,  97-113, 

301. 

Portrait  of,  120,  134. 
Liberty,  Lazenby,  64. 
Liddell,  Dean,  323. 
Lillie  in  Our  Alley,  77. 
Lindsey  Row,  houses  in,  48,  49,  59,  101, 

102,   104,   108,  116,  117,  121,  124,  130, 

139,161. 

Linton,  Sir  James,  15. 
Lithography  and  Lithographers,  III,  147. 
Little  Cardinal,  The,  264. 
Little  Johannes,  306. 
Little  Lady  Sophie,  77,  281. 
Little  Rose  of  Lyme  Regis,  287. 
Little  White  Girl,  The,  48,  49,  78,  126,  161, 

191, 199,  200,  300,  325. 
Lobsters,  The  Loves  of  the,  134 
Loeser,  C.,  47. 

334 


London  Garland,  A,  15,  73. 

Long  Bridge,  The,  251. 

Lord  Donoughmore,  20. 

Louvre,  the,  48, 64,  85,  89, 90, 93,  94, 169, 

171,  247. 

Lowrie,  Mrs.,  272. 
Lucas,  George  A.,  55,  56,  85,  87,  154,  164, 

277. 

Ludovici,  A.,  40,275. 
Lungren,  Fernand,   54,  57,  58,  217-219. 
Lungren,Mrs.Fernand,  54,  57,58,  217-219. 
Luxembourg,  the,  84,  205,  230. 
Lyme  Regis,  56. 

MACCOLL,  D.  S.,  9,  13, 191, 192, 225,  236, 

237,  275,  276,  278,  294. 
Mac  Ewen,  Walter,  197. 
MacKay,  A.,  172,  230. 
Maclaren,  Ian,  179. 
MacLaughlan,  D.  S.,  159-161. 
MacLaughlan,  Mrs.  D.  S.,  160. 
MacManus,  Blanche,  220. 
Macmillan,  Mrs.  Maurice,  58. 
MacMonnies,  Frederick,  309. 
MacMonnies,  Mrs.,  262. 
Macquoid,  Percy,  269. 
Magazine  of  Art,  The,  198-200. 
Burlington,  The,  296. 
Mallarme,  St£phane,  n. 

Vers  et  Prose,  II. 

Manet,  E.,  78, 192,  201,  217,  267,  296. 
Mansfield,  Howard,  2, 81, 112, 147,  309. 
Mansfield,  Mrs.  H.,  220. 
Marchant,  William,  133,  136,  137,  140, 

142,143,259. 
gallery,  138. 

Marchesi,  Madame,  227. 
Marks,  Murray,  109,  no,  302,  326. 
Martin,  Dr.  Benjamin  Ellis,  4. 
Martin,  Mrs.  Bradley,  19,  20. 
Martin,  Henri,  88,  92. 
Martin,  Homer,  229,  230,  233. 
Martin,  J.,  117. 
Martineau,  Harriet,  318. 
Matin,  Le,  296. 
Maud    (Maud  Franklin),  69,    102,   105, 

118,  119,  163,164,166,254. 
Maxse,  Admiral,  196,  217. 
Mazzini,  174. 
McCarter,  Henry,  156. 
McCarthy,  Justin,  225. 
McCullock,  George,  46, 113. 
Mcllvaine,  Clarence  B.,  158. 
McNeill,  Miss,  Eliza,  104, 182. 


INDEX 


McQueen,  W.,  48. 

Melchers,  Gari,  309. 

Melville,  Arthur,  215. 

Memorial  Exhibition  in  London,  Whistler, 


1905,   113,  122,  145. 
in  Paris, 


1905   84. 
Memnas,  Las,  5,  225. 
Menpes,  Mortimer,  5, 63, 65, 66, 115, 141, 

1 80,  225,  241,  250,  260,  288,  296. 
Mere  Gerard,  La,  78,  80,93. 
Meredith,George,  24, 25, 170,  262,  263,3 16. 
Meredith,  Owen,  227. 
Merritt,  Mrs.  Anna  Lea,  3. 
Meryon,  C.,  267. 
Metropolitan  Museum,  4, 183. 
Metsu,  39. 
Meyer,  G.,  148. 
Meunier,  Constantin,  6, 7. 
Michael,  Angelo,  26,41,64,171,175. 
Michie,  Coutts,  113. 
Milcendeau,  Charles,  153. 
Miles,  Frank,  119. 
Millais,  Sir  J.  E.,  22,  23,  25,  29,  64,  129, 

232. 

Life  oj,  26. 
Millais,  Lady,  25. 
Millet,  Jean-Franpois,  72,73. 
Milner,  Sir  Frederick,  54. 
Mirbeau,  Octave,  267,  268. 
Miss  Alexander,  Portrait  of  Miss  Cicely 

H.  (Mrs.  Spring-Rice),  10,  69,  73,  116, 

^123,  285,  301,325. 
Mitchell,    Dr.    Chalmers,   39,    197,   223, 

224,  296. 
Mitchell,    Mrs.  Chalmers,   38,  39,   197, 

223,  224. 

Moncrieff,  Mrs.  Lynedoch,  227. 
Monna  Lisa,  167. 
Montesquio,  Comte  Robert  de,  270. 

Portrait  of,  270,  271. 
Moore,  Albert,  123, 141,  229,  233,  320. 
Moore,  George,  9,  10,  241,  285. 
Moran,  Peter,  2. 
Moreau  Nelaton  Collection,  80. 
Morgan,  J.  P.,  99. 
Morgan,  William  De,  178. 
Morley,  John,  24. 

Morning  Post,  The,  109, 138,  227,  247. 
Morris,  Harrison  S.,  25,  156,  239,  247,  308. 
Morris,  Mrs.  Harrison  S.,  170,  239. 
Morris,  Phil,  103, 104, 123, 213. 
Morris,  William,  27,  251,   299,  300,  301, 

3°3>  30.v 
Morris,  Mrs.  William,  62. 


Morse,  Sidney,  34. 

Moscheles,  Felix,  70, 151. 

Mother,  The,  3,  66,  73,  84,  116, 12O,  121, 

123,  169,174,184,301,  325. 
Moulton,  Fletcher,  62. 
Mount  Ararat,  113, 134. 
Muller,  I  wan,  30,  31. 
Mura,  Frank,  70, 71. 
Mura,  Mrs.  Frank,  70. 
Murray,  C,  Fairfax,  66. 
Music  Room,  The,  10, 129. 
Musset,  Alfred  de,  86. 

Napolitaine,  La,  243. 

National  Academy  of  Design,  52,  156. 

National    Collection,  Washington,    82, 

134- 

National  Gallery,  14,  17,  41,48,49,78, 

120. 

National  Liberal  Club,  158. 

National,  Observer,  The,  8,9. 

National  Portrait  Gallery,  184. 

Nation,  The,  275. 

Nesmith,  Joseph  A.,  308,  316. 

Nevill,  Lady  Dorothy,  184. 

Nevinson,  H.  W.,  170. 

New,  Edmund  A.,  314. 

New  English  Art  Club,  9,  20, 192, 268. 

New  York  Herald,   The,  246. 

Paris  Edition,  228. 
New  York  Sun,  The,  275. 
New  York  Times  Saturday  Review,  Thf,2^O. 
Nicholson,  William,  138,  309. 
Norton,  Charles  Eliot,  321. 
Northcliffe,  Lord,  138. 
Nocturnes,  Marines  and  Chevalet  Pieces,  10. 
Nocturne  in  Blue  and  Gold,  Whistler's,  321. 
Note  Blanche,  161. 
Notes,  Harmonies,  Nocturnes,  5. 

OcHs,Mrs.,  197,  309. 
O'Connor,  Francis  (see  Howard). 
Ohl,  Mrs.,  57,  58,  73,  77. 
Old  Batter  sea  Bridge,  10, 138. 
Olivarez,  Velasquez,  120. 
Once  a  Week,  306. 
Orpen,  Sir  William,  138,  312. 
Oulevey,  M.,  83,  86-90, 93-95. 
Owl  and  the  Cabinet,  The,  34. 
Oxon,  J.  R.,  327. 

PADDON,  S.  Wreford,  61. 
P addon  Papers,  The,  64,  295. 
Paimpol,  56. 

335 


INDEX 


Pall  Mall  Gazette,  The,  6,  9,  30,  134,  143, 

198-200. 
Palmer,  Mrs.  Potter,  16,  57,  125, 127,  155, 

309,  .3i6. 
Panizzi,  74. 
Paris  International  Exposition  of  1900,  40, 

190,  192,  199,  200,  217. 
Parry,  Judge  E.  T.,  316,  321. 
Passing  Under  Battersea  Bridge,  Greaves', 

137,  138,  144- 
Paulus,Herr,  150. 
Pawling,  Sydney  S.,  276. 
Peacock    Room,    the,  98,   IOO,  103,  105. 

109,  112,  113,  117. 

Portrait,  302,  320,  326. 
Pellegrini,  €.,163. 

Portrait  of  Whistler,  237. 
Penn,  William,  258. 
Pennsylvania  Academy  of  the  Fine  Arts, 

3,141,156. 
Pepys,  Samuel,  219. 
Petit, Georges,  in. 
Philip,  R.  Birnie,  207,  296. 
Philip,  Mrs.  Birnie,   153,  220,  231,  234, 

241,  242,  255. 
Philip,  Ethel  Birnie  (see  Whibley,  Mrs. 

Charles). 
Philip,  Rosalind  Birnie,  40,  45,  50,  51,67, 

77,  134,  148,  149,  153,  158,  166,  191, 

194,  195,  220,  223,  234,  235,  237,  245, 

246,  255-263,  266,  269,  270,  272,  276, 

277,  281,286-293,295,  296. 
Phillip,  John,  79,  82. 
Phillips,  Sir  Claude,  10,  264,  265. 
Philosopher,  The,  in. 
Phryne,  217,  243. 

Piano  Picture,  The,  78, 79, 82, 95,  285. 
Piero  della  Francesca,  299. 
Plymouth,  Lord,  307. 
Plunkett,  Count,  309. 
Pollitt,  A.J.,295. 
Poore,  Harry  R.,  2. 
Pope,  A.  Atmore,i3O. 
Portfolio,  The,  186. 
Pourville,  56. 

Poynter,  Sir  Edward,  49,  50. 
Pre-Raphaelites,  The,  22,  26, 27. 
Pretty  Nellie  Brown,  173. 
Prinsep,  Mrs.  Val,  105. 

Portrait  of,  by  Val  Prinsep,  103. 
Prince,  Charles,  52,53. 
Princesse  du  Pays  de  la  Porcelaine,  La, 

101,  126,  132,  300. 
Princess  Louise,  121, 185. 

336 


Propositions,  36,  296. 
Prothero,  Mrs.,  199. 
Pulitzer,  Mr.,  225,  226. 
Puvis,  de  Chavannes,  299. 
Pyle,  Howard,  314. 

QUILTER,  Harry,   303. 

RACKHAM,  Arthur,  309. 
Radford,  Ernest,  193,  J94- 
Radford,  Sir  George,  216. 
Raffaelli,T.  F.,  267,268,  309. 
Rawlinsons,  W.  L,  129,  267, 268. 
Redesdale,  Lord,  64,  108,  129,  133,  255, 

3°9>  31°- 

Redesdale,  Lady,  128,  309. 
Reid,  Alexander,  4. 
Reid,  Whitelaw,  309. 
Reinhardt,  Messrs.,  133, 136. 
Rembrandt,  3, 81, 96, 167, 187,  245. 
Repplier,  Agnes,  185. 
Reynolds,  156. 

Reynolds,  Sir  Joshua,  266,  276. 
Rhodes,  Harrison,  211,  234, 235. 
Ribot,T.,  201. 
Ricci,C,  46. 
Ricketts,  Charles,  275. 
Richmond,  Sir  William,B.,  225,  326. 
Rijks  Museum,  247. 
Rinder,  Frank,  262,  269. 
Ringler  &  Co.,  Messrs.,  H7- 
Roberts,  Lord,  54- 
Robertson,  Graham,  277,  279, 280. 
Robins,  Elizabeth,  223,  224,  306. 
Robins,  Helen,  2ii. 
Robinson  and  Fisher's,  69, 70,  143. 
Rodd,  Sir  Rennell,  309. 
Rodin,  A.,  48,  201,  213,  235-237,  242,  283, 

307-309,  3ii-3i6. 
Balzac,  201. 
Burghers  of  Calais,  23. 
Whistler  Memorial,  307-316. 
Rose,  Anderson, 65,  317,  319,  320,326. 
Rosenbach  Company,  The,  141. 
Ross,  Mrs.  Janet,  47. 
Ross,  Robert,  63,  64,  133,  138-  139,  143, 

183,  316. 
Rossetti,  Dante  Gabriel,  7,  23~27,  34,  58, 

62-64,  79,  84,  101,  104,  no,  119,   129, 

157,  170,  171,  252,  272,  273,  295,  300, 

313. 
Rossetti,  William  Michael,  83,  84,  296, 

316,  320,  326. 
Rothenstein,  William,  16,143,202. 


INDEX 


Roullier,  Albert,  145-1 47,  23°- 

Rousseau,  M.,  219. 

Roussel,  Theodore,  216,  231. 

Rowe,  Mrs.  Jopling,  167. 

Royal  Academy,  22,  39,  49,  50, 151,  194- 

196,213. 

Royal  Historical  Society,  1 58. 
Roycroft  Press,  274. 
Ruskin,  John,  7,  8,  25,  68,  103,  214,  248, 

283. 

Ruskin,  Mrs. ,25. 
Ruskin  Case,  The,  60/164,  212,  213,233, 

Russell,  R.  H.,  146. 
Russian  Schube,  The,  14. 

SAGE,  Miss,  279. 
St.  Anne's,  Soho,  72. 
St.Gaudens,  A.,  156, 174,  308. 
St.  Helier,  Lady,  309. 
St.  James's,  The,  216. 
St.  Louis  Exposition,  277. 
Salaman,  Malcolm,  248,  249. 
Sala,  G.  A.,  10. 
Salting,  George,  314. 
Sandra  Belloni,  25,  26. 
Sandys  Frederick,  21-23, 17°- 

The  Nightmare,  22. 
Sarasate,  4. 
Sargent,  John  S.,  34,  35,  39,  46,  143,  154, 

168,  213,  236-238,  251,  262,  263,  277, 

281    309. 
Sassoferato,  62. 

Saturday  Review,  The,  9,  14, 192. 
Sauter,  George,   14,   150,   151,   160,  206, 

207,  210,  222,  233,  237,  239,  247,  256, 
263,  273-276,  291,  295,  297,  307, 
3°9- 

Sauter,  Mrs.  George,  151,  1 60,  1 80,  233, 

291,  295. 

SavileClub,  11,230. 
Scammon  Lectures,  155. 
Scheffer,  Ary,  122. 
Scots  Observer,  The,  8. 
Second  Venice  Set,  The,  66. 
SelseyBill,6i,  134. 
Selsey  Bill  Sands,  65. 
Seton,Miss,  257,  286. 
Seule  (The  Coast  of  Brittany;  Alone  with 

the  Tide),  156. 
Shannon,  J.  J.,  151,  152,  201,  213,  275, 

281. 

Shaw,  George  Bernard,  9,  309. 
Shaw,  Mrs.  Graham,  33. 

22 


Shaw,  Norman,  226. 

Shadow  of  the  Cross,  The,  Holman  Hunt's, 

26. 

Short,  Sir  Frank,  78,  80,  8 1,  207. 
Shorter,  C.  K.,  16,  314. 
Sickert,  Oswald,  259,  260. 
Sickert,     Walter,     9,    14,    67,    81,    143, 

228. 

Sickert,  Mrs.  Walter,  161, 166. 
Simpson,  Mrs.,  237. 
Sir  Isumbras  at  the  Ford,  Millais',  22. 
Six  Projects,  The,  126,161. 
Smalley,  George  W.,  84. 
Smith,  G.  L.,  23,  318. 
Society  of  American  Artists,  156. 
Society  of  Illustrators,  15. 
Sotheby's,  189. 
Soupe  d  Trois  Sous,  92. 
South  Kensington  Exhibitions,  20,  22, 

I375I44-. 

South  Kensington  Museum,  175. 
Spartali,  Miss,  126. 
Speaker,  The,  9. 
Spectator,  The,  9. 
SpekeHall,S4. 

Spencer,  Mr.,  125, 127-129, 133, 136. 
Spielmann,  M.  H.,  198-200,  202,  203,206, 

3°9- 

Spreckles,  Mrs.,  113. 
Spy  and  Ape,  141, 184. 
Standard,  The,  264,  265,  269. 
Stansfield,  James,  124,  219. 
Star,   The,  9,  54,  77,  142,  146,    186,  271, 

292. 

Steer,  P.  Wilson,  21, 46,  202. 
Steevens,  George  W.,  9. 
Stephens,  F.  G.,  10. 
Stevens,  Mr.,  113. 
Stevenson,  R.  A.  M.,  (Bob),  9, 10. 
Stevenson,  Robert  Louis,  34, 177,  282. 
Stevenson,  Macaulay,  288. 
Stillman,  Mrs.  W.  J.,  99, 106. 
Stott,  William,  166,288. 
Strang,  David,  296. 
Strang,  William,  296. 
Strange,  E.  F.,  138,  203,  257. 
Streatham  Town  Hall,  118. 
Strindberg,  Madame  Frida,  133, 135. 
Stuart,  Gilbert,  135. 
Studd,  Arthur,  43,  48,  49,  59,  263,  269, 

296,  297. 

Studio,  The,  295,  300. 
Sturges,  Jonathan,  193,  202,  205. 
Sullivan,  E.  J.,  16, 21, 185, 202, 206,  309. 

337 


INDEX 


Sutherland,    Sir  Thomas,    106-109,    207, 

229,232. 
Swan,  John,  215. 
Swift,  Benjamin,  272. 
Swinburne,  A.  C.,  24,  26,  63,  78,  80,  170, 

247,  252. 

Symons,  Arthur,  38,  39. 
Symphonies  in  White,  1 20. 
Symphony  in  White,  No.  Ill,  161. 

TATE  Gallery,  251. 

Taylor,  Tom,  117,  326. 

Telegraph,  The  Daily,  10,  264. 

Ten  O'clock,  The,  8,  3 1, 199,  302,  305. 

Terborgh,   39. 

Thames  in  Ice,  The,  79,  82, 120. 

Thames  Set,  The,  2,  104. 

Thaw,  Mrs.,  135. 

Thaulow,  F.,  14,  151,153,  309. 

Theobald,  K.  C.,  Mr.  H.  S.,  112,  309. 

Thomas,  Percy,  165. 

'Thompson,  Sir  Henry,  306. 

Thomson,  David  Croal,   10,  65,  1 12,  191, 

192, 196,  296,  307,  309. 
Three  Girls,  The,  134,233. 
Thynne,  Mrs.,  129,  296. 
Thynne,  Miss,  296. 
Times,  The,  10,  48,  137,  139,    141,    142, 

191, 192,  259,  261,  284,  295,  326. 
Tintoretto,  154,  249. 
Titian,  26, 154. 
Tomson,  Mrs.  Arthur,  130. 
Tonks,  Henry,  202. 
Trevelyan,  George,  309. 
Tribune,  The,  273. 
Tristan  and  Isolde,  12. 
Troubetzkoi,  Prince,  150. 
Truth,  183, 184. 
Tuckerman,  Miss,  238. 
Turner,  J.  M.  W.,  7, 120,  228,  248. 
Tweed,  J.,  235. 
Twenty-fifth  of  December,  The,  79. 

UFFIZI,  The,  45,  47. 

Untermeyer,  Mrs.,  4. 

Unwin,  Mr.  T.  Fisher,  76,  in,  112,  168, 

218,  280,  296. 
Unwin,  Mrs. ,T.  Fisher,  168,280. 

VALE,  The,  119,165,167. 
Vale  of  Rest,  The,  Millais,  70. 
Valparaiso,  41-43, 48, 113,253. 
Valparaiso,  134,  279. 

338 


Vanderbilt,   George,  193,  202,  237,  297, 

307,  309- 

Vanderbilt,  Mrs.  George,  237,  264. 

Van  Dyke,  Mr.  John  C,  30. 

American  Painting  and  Its  Tradition, 
31.    Modern  French  Masters,   162. 

Velasquez,  99,  120,  162,  193,  227. 

Venetian  Interior,  A.,  Sargent's,  39. 

Venice  Sets,  The,2,  188. 

Venice  show  at  Fine  Art  Society,  182. 

Venturi  Madame,  124, 174. 

Veronese,  249. 

Victoria  and  Albert  Museum,  203. 

Viele- Griffin,  12. 

Violet  and  Gold,  120. 

WALKER,  Martineau   &     Co.,     Messrs., 

317,  326. 

Waller,  Pickford,  302,  309. 
Wallis,  Whitworth,  309. 
Walton,  E.  A.,  206,  275,  279,  286,  309. 
Walton,  Mrs.  E.  A.,  272,279. 
Wanamaker,  Mr.  173. 
Wapping,  119, 122, 161. 
Ward,  T.  Humphry,  10,  82,  192,  281, 

284. 

Ward,  Mrs.  T.  Humphry,  230. 
Warr,  Mrs.,  70. 
Warwick,  Lady,  236. 
Watts-Dunton,  Theodore,  no,  175,  194, 

255- 

Way,  Thomas,  106,  133,  134,  148,  294. 
Way,  T.  R.,  66,  81,  105,  106,  115,  133- 

135,148,149,233,251,294,  313,  316. 
Weary,  161. 
Webb,  William,  200,  206,  222,  223,  238, 

244,  274,  294,  296,  307. 
Wedmore,  Sir  Frederick,  10, 146,  264-269, 

281. 

Wells,  H.  G.,  309. 
Wertheimer,  Asher,  Sargent's,  140. 
Westminster  Gazette,  The,  138. 
West  Point,  42,  48,  74-77,  154,  i8o,.i8i, 

195,  210-212,  216,  228,  234,  236,  240, 

242,  276. 

West  Point  Memorial,  242. 
Wales,  Prince  of,  176. 
Wheeler,  General  Joe,  240. 
Whibley, Charles,  1,9, 13,  37,  224,  226,  296. 

Book  af  Scoundrels,  306. 
Whibley,  Mrs.  Charles,  (Ethel  Birnie 

Philip),  37,  200,  245,  262,  284,  291, 

293- 
Whirlwind,  The,  148. 


INDEX 


Whistler's  House  at  Chelsea,  3. 

Life  of,  3,  13, 14,  27,  30,  32, 33,  40,  41, 
45,  SS»  65,  68,  83,  100,  in,  125,  145, 
158,  160,  165,  167,  182,  184,  188,  214, 
215,  216,  227,  239,  242,  247, 254, 274, 
^  287,  289,  295,  297. 

Whistler  Thomas,  4. 

Whistler,  Mrs.  Thomas,  163. 
Dr.  William,  48, 113,163. 
Mrs.  Dr.  William,  10,  31,  55,  74, 

IO3,    IO4,    112,   113,   1 19,    123,     129, 

133, 134, 152, 154,  157, 163,  165, 

1 66,  189,  247,    251-254,  262,  296, 
303- 

Whitefriars  Club,  194. 
White,  Archer,  224,  225,  226. 
White  Girl,  The,  4,  80,  134,  144,  157,  161- 

163,184,191,325. 
White,  Gleason,  26. 
Whitehall  Court,  29. 
White  House,  65, 133,  164, 186,  283. 
Whitman,  Mrs.  Sarah,  153,  154,  185,238. 
Whitman,  Walt,  3,  24,  71, 168. 

Leaves  of  Grass,  24,  26. 
Wilde,  Oscar,  3, 1 19,  205,  228. 
Williams,  Captain,  171. 


Williamson,  Dr.  G.  C,  64. 
Wills,  W.  G.,  321. 
Wilson,  Edgar,  30. 
Wilson,  Harry,  33,  34,  294,  307. 
Wilstach  Collection,  4. 
Wimbush,  W.  L.,  54. 
Winans,  Thomas,  171. 
Wisselingh,  E.  J.  Van,  264. 
Withers,  Alfred,  160. 
Withers,  Mrs.  I.  Dods,  160. 
Wolseley,  Lord,  121. 
Wood,  Butler,  309. 
Wood,  Durwent,  312. 
/ForW,  7X183,184,  319. 
Wren,  Sir  Christopher,  41. 
Wunderlich,  Messrs.,  2. 
Wyndham,  George,  307. 
Wyndham,  Mrs.,  103. 

YATES,  Edmund,  183. 
Yellow  Buskin,  The,  4. 

ZAEHNSDORF,  Messrs.,  176. 
Zola,  E.,  296. 
Zug,  George  B.,  73. 


339 


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